The Breakfast Club

The other day, tired of wondering which new summer blockbuster to watch on DVD next, I found Pat’s copy of “The Breakfast Club”. What the heck, I thought, its been years since I watched that show…

And the next 90 minutes, I was enthralled as I was transported by to the 80’s, to my secondary school life, to the great music growing up, to our teenage struggles with our identity, our parents, disciplinary teachers, and journey of discovering who we really are inside.

For those grew in a different decade, or never got to watched 'The Breakfast Club', it’s a amazing teen movie by John Hughes. It’s about 5 high school kids forced into detention class early on a Saturday morning for different disciplinary misdemeanours. What followed was a movie that captured the imagination of a generation of youths, and went down as one of the movies that defined the glorious decade.

"...And these children
that you spit on
as they try to change their worlds
are immune to your consultations.
They're quite aware
of what they're going through..."
David Bowie

, shown at the start of the film




5 teens, Emilio Estevez as Andrew the wrestling team jock, Molly Ringwald as Claire, the popular rich daddy’s girl, Anthony Michael Hall as the science geek Brian, the fabulous Ally Sheedy in a career high performance as the runaway basketcase chick Allison, and Judd Nelson puts in a good turn as John Bender, the school problem tough kid. Paul Gleason is the cocky school principal who tries (and fails) to impose his authority on the students (there’s also a creepy Janitor in the mix).

(pic from wikipedia)

8 hours in detention gives the 5 kids a roller-coaster of emotions and bonding, but the kids get over their initial seemingly irreconcilable differences, and find that they share a lot of similarities in life. They share their sexual awakenings, smoke some pot, bitch about parents and ultimately made some new friends.

At the end of the day, the ultimate question of who they really are by their own definition, not by what their parents (who pressure or ignore them all the time) or their teachers want them to be.

If you haven’t seen the movie, watch it. It’s a great movie. Especially if you’re teen, and you think that your parents and teachers don’t really understand you.

Dear Mr. Vernon, we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it is we did wrong, but we think you're crazy for making us write an essay telling you who we think we are. You see us as you want to see us, in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain, and an athlete, and a basketcase, a princess, and a criminal. Does that answer your question? Sincerely yours, The Breakfast Club.

A few months a remember watching the MTV movie awards, where they awarded the movie and reunited part of the cast on stage and ran a fitting tribute to the movie. I wonder if anyone has a copy of that clip? I’d love to see it again…