Well, most of us are trapped in our homes right now, so say we take a look at a film
where five high school students are trapped at school on a Saturday. Although, it’s
highly likely that many teenagers would love to be back at school now, even if it was on Saturday.
Here is everything you need to know about The Breakfast Club.
In just two days, specifically July 4 and
5, 1982, John Hughes writes a screenplay. That wasn’t no thing for Hughes, who had
written lots of stuff for the magazine National Lampoon. And he already had two screenplays
under his belt...National Lampoon’s Vacation and Mr. Mom, as matter of fact. Around the
time he wrote this screenplay, which later would become the film The Breakfast Club,
he had also written a screenplay for another future film called Sixteen Candles.
Well Hughes filmed Sixteen Candles first after he got a three-film deal to direct his films
with Universal Pictures. He wrote the screenplay for that after seeing a headshot of a young
actress named Molly Ringwald. That’s right, her headshot inspired the entire film, apparently.
Anyway, after production completed for Sixteen Candles, Hughes told Ringwald he had another
film for her to star in. That was The Breakfast Club.
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Ok, back to The Breakfast Club… Another young actor from Sixteen Candles John
Hughes wanted in it? Anthony Michael Hall. He was the first one to officially get a role.
Brian Johnson, and that’s his mom and sister in real life in that scene with him, by the way.
Ringwald wanted to play and eventually got the role of Claire Standish, even though Hughes
originally wanted her to play the role of Allison Reynolds. Hughes later got Ally Sheedy
to play that role instead. Emilio Estevez auditioned for the role of John Bender, but
after Hughes couldn’t find someone good to play the role of Andrew Clark, gave Estevez
that role instead. John Cusack almost got the role of Bender, but Hughes thought he
didn’t look threatening enough, so he cast Judd Nelson instead. The only two other characters
to have any significant amount of dialogue in the film were the janitor, played by John
Kapelos, and the assistant principal, played by Paul Gleason.
All Universal gave Hughes was $1 million, and that’s only because he promised he would
only be filming at one location. Ned Tanen, who had worked with Hughes on previous films,
joined as co-producer. Filming began at Maine North High School in Des Plaines, Illinois,
a Chicago suburb, on March 28, 1984 and carried on until the end of May. It used to be an
actual high school, but had closed down three years prior so they didn’t have to worry
about students in real life. However, the library there was too small, so Hughes had
the crew build the library you see in the film in the actual school’s gymnasium. Hughes
also decided to make another film simultaneously at the same place to save time and money.
You also likely know about that one. It’s called Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Hughes
and Nelson famously did not get along that well on set, supposedly because Nelson continued
to act like a bully when the cameras stopped.
By the way, Hughes named it The Breakfast Club because one of his friends had a son
who went to a school where they called Sunday detention the Breakfast Club.
Universal premiered the film in Los Angeles on February 7, 1985, and everywhere else a
week later. Critics generally praised it and it was a smash hit. The Breakfast Club eventually
made around $52 million worldwide.
While you should definitely watch it yourself,
here is the basic storyline. It’s March 24, 1984, and five students at Shermer High
School show up bright and early for an all-day Saturday detention. Each of the five matches
a stereotype, representing different cliques. There’s Claire, the stuck-up, well-to-do
beauty queen, Brian, the geeky, Dungeons and Dragons type, Andrew, the popular jock wrestler
dude, John, the rebel nihilist, and Allison, the freaky, almost goth-like outcast. For
the most part, they don’t know each other, so we assume that this is a very big high school.
They sit fairly spread out in the library, and a disciplinarian type assistant principal
named Richard Vernon comes in telling them they are to not do anything without his permission.
And they’re stuck there until 4.
Vernon: You will not move
from this seats.
And you
you will not sleep.
Oh, and he tells them
Vernon: Alright, people. We're gonna try something a little different today.
We are going to write an essay.
Of no less than 1,000 words
describing to me who you think you are.
And they listen to Mr. Vernon, well….for a bit
anyway. John, who clearly has had a long, antagonistic relationship with Mr. Vernon
quickly breaks those rules and tries to rile up the other students. He harrasses Brian
and Andrew and basically sexually harrasses Claire. Soon Mr. Vernon is back and gives
John eight more Saturday detentions. However, after some tense moments of conflict, eventually
the students rally around to defend John as he finds himself in trouble with Mr. Vernon
yet again. Vernon - What in God's name is going on in here?"
What was that ruckus?
Uh what ruckus?
I was just in my office, and I heard a ruckus.
Could you describe the ruckus, sir?
This is a turning point, and for the rest of the film the students get to know
each other at a much, much deeper level, and quickly learn they have much more in common
than they previously realized.
Few films before The Breakfast Club so earnestly
showed what it truly meant to feel the angst of a teenager. First of all, the acting was
quite good, despite some cheesy moments that show up from time to time. Previous teen films
often felt more like 40-year olds writing about the teenage perspective, but this film
felt like actual teenagers wrote it. It probably helped that both Ringwald and Hall were 16-year
olds themselves. The other three were actually in their early twenties.
Still, just like he did with his film Sixteen Candles, it’s like Hughes opened up a window
to a whole new world viewers didn’t know about. Teenagers were finally being heard.
It was raw. It was relatable. And sure, it seems cliche today, but people forget it was
the FIRST to do all this.
The Breakfast Club is mostly about the struggle of the suburban American teenager to truly
be understood, both by adults and also by themselves.
Boundaries are broken. These five students are forced to break out of their normal environments,
and in the process learn quite a bit about themselves. This, during a time in their lives
where they actually don’t know nearly enough about themselves.
The film is also about status...about how all of us, not just suburban American teenagers,
often form hierarchies and then proceed to pretend that these hierarchies don’t exist.
And finally, The Breakfast Club brilliantly shows us what can happen when we are forced
to hit the pause button in our life or when we are forced to go into quarantine with people
we barely know, even though I think we thought we knew those people. But yeah, as it turns
out we didn’t. Ok, is this still about The Breakfast Club?
The Breakfast Club basically was the quintessential
coming of age film for Generation Xers everywhere. It’s consistently ranked as one of the best
teen films of all time, and the best movie ever made by John Hughes. Teen films? Heck,
John Hughes practically invented the modern definition of “teen film” with The Breakfast
Club, Sixteen Candles, and these other films.
Its soundtrack even became iconic, representing being a teen in the 1980s. In 2005, on the
20th anniversary of its release, the film received the Silver Bucket of Excellence Award
at the MTV Movie Awards, and most of the cast was even there to reunite for it. In 2015,
on the 30th anniversary of its release, Universal digitally remastered it and re-screened it
across the country. The next year, the Library of Congress selected to preserve it in the
National Film Registry due to it being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
Today, The Breakfast Club is practically synonymous with all of the 1980s. Virtually all teen
movies afterward can credit The Breakfast Club as at least a partial influence.
It is currently certified 89% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, and what’s remarkable is that
it continues to resonate more with teenagers of today, 35 years after things that used
to be in style clearly went out of style. In other words, The Breakfast Club is timeless.
We are nostalgic for it, but we are also amazed at how, despite the technology dramatically
changing, the teenagers themselves haven’t changed much over the years. They still feel
like freaks. They still want to rebel. They still want to fight. They still want to be
respected. They still want to be understood.
There I am at Maine North High School, which is today a police station. Even though I wasn’t
in high school until at least 12 years after The Breakfast Club came out, the film will
always have a special place in my heart. And for the record, I hated high school. Ironically,
I teach high school now. So what do you think? Do you think the film really holds up 35
years later, like I said? Also, what other film would you like to see explained in a
similar fashion? Let me know in the comments below. Thanks for subscribing, liking, and
sharing this video. Wait, you didn’t do that? Well this is awkward.