Last week’s column left you with a promise – to follow up the iconic 1980s films that shaped my childhood with the equally iconic romcoms from the same period that coloured my (scarily misshapen, back then) idea of romance.
Top on the list just has to be The Breakfast Club, and for many reasons. It’s a story about friendships and how they’re formed, about finding your own niche in high school (or Sixth Form, for us, back then), about first love, rebellion and everything that makes the teenage years so special.
Five students are kept in detention on a Saturday morning. All the usual stereotypes are there: criminal, athlete, brain (the word ‘geek’ hadn’t yet been invented back then), nutter, princess. By the end of the movie, of course, they’ve become friends. And the first seeds of love have been planted among some of them.
The plot is a no-brainer, really. But, despite – or maybe because of – its innocence, it’s one of those movies I’ll be quite happy to watch again and again. I’m not alone thinking this: Empire placed it a number 369 in its 500 Greatest Movies of All Time list, while in 2005, the film received the Silver Bucket of Excellence Award in celebration of its 20th anniversary at the MTV Movie Awards.
In the tradition of all iconic films that represent an era, The Breakfast Club had a superb soundtrack, including Simple Minds’ hit single Don’t You Forget About Me.
Then, of course, there’s Pretty in Pink, also one of the Brat Pack movies (for those of you who missed the previous column, the Brat Pack movies are those starring a particular set of 1980s actors and actresses).
Once again, it’s all about cliques at high school, this time with the more serious topic of class division thrown in.
Andy hails from your typical working-class family. As working-class girls in films tend to do, they get a massive crush on one of the rich boys at school. A series of dates, disaster and heartbreak follow. Where’s the comedy in this, you might ask? Ah, but these are the 1980s, when everything came with a ‘happily ever after’.
The ‘happily ever after’, in this case, is provided courtesy of potential love interest number two: Andy’s childhood friend Duckie. Is it platonic friendship? Is it budding love? Or will rich kid Blane come through for Andy.
Again, the film rushes to a highly predictable – and satisfying, as long as you’re a 16-year-old girl or in the mood to behave like one – end.
Pretty in Pink comes with an equally illustrious, if slightly bewildering, soundtrack, featuring the likes of Orchestral Manouevres in the Dark, Suzanne Vega, INXS, New Order, The Psychedelic Furs, Eco and the Bunnymen and The Smiths.
I say bewildering, because a number of these bands – most notably New Order, The Psychedelic Furs, The Smiths, Eco and the Bunnymen – went on to gather a niche following themselves, a following that remains strong to date. Much, like that of the movie itself.
Just falling within the 1980s band (it was released in 1989) is Say Anything, which you could say was my first John Cusack film ever. In all honesty, Say Anything is a pretty mediocre film by all accounts.
It made every young girl watching it long for her own version of John Cusack
With one notable exception: the scene where Cusack drives up under his would-be lover’s bedroom window, Romeo-style. He whips out one of those massive stereos we all had back in the day and serenades his love. And, of course, they both live happily ever after.
What makes this movie so awesome – apart from the fact that the scene has been re-enacted, spoofed and lampooned in dozens of subsequent movies – is how it made every young girl watching it long for her own version of John Cusack (preferably, looking not too different from Cusack) to serenade her with a boombox.
And it also made every teenage boy who watched it sure that he could do it.
Ah, teenage romance!
rdepares@timesofmalta.com