Thursday, March 24, 2011

Don't you....forget about me...

March 24th. Not a big date for many of us, right? Maybe it's someone's birthday, or an anniversary here and there, but nothing monumental..right?

Wrong. Well, at least for me anyway.

I just learned a very important bit of trivia from a friend's facebook status. March 24 (and in this case the year was 1984) was the date for the Saturday detention in "The Breakfast Club"...one of my favorite movies of all time.


It is one of those movies I am usually shocked to find someone has never seen. L, who is pretty notorious for not having seen many, many movies, claims to have seen all the different parts of Breakfast Club at some time or another by now. I still think she needs to sit down and watch it start to finish. After all, did you know that's how the movie was shot? Sequentially. It's very rare for a movie to be made that way (for a variety of reasons.) Bet you also might not know the script for the movie was written in 2 days. TWO.

I discovered many of these little trivia gems when I read "You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried." I tore through this book in about a day and a half, I just loved learning all about my favorite movies so much. This is a MUST read if you are someone like me who likes all things John Hughes and has a soft spot for well made 80's teen movies.

Yes please note my use of the phrase "well made" cause all 80's teen movies are not the same. Don't get me wrong, I love "Weird Science", "Teen Witch" and "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun." But if you are a fan of this genre like I am...you know that there are some really well made movies in this group that stand the test of time. And "Breakfast Club" is one of them.

It's what a good movie should be. It tells a story that is accessible to everyone. An experience many of us have shared. Characters that we can all identify with, that we see ourselves in. Characters that grow and change over the course of 97 minutes and come out slightly different at the end.

It's something so simple. Who were you in high school? Because you HAVE to be able to be categorized as something, right? How does it get decided if you're going to be a brain, an outcast, an athlete, a punk, or a princess? How long do you have to hold that title...a few years? Forever? For some of us that experience in high school could go on forever. For some of us, it could not end soon enough. I think we are all too young to realize it then, but later in life we all get to a point where we realize, just as the character of Andrew astutely observes, "We're all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it, that's all."

For all the movies they keep dragging out of the vault to makeover, "The Breakfast Club" has stayed neatly tucked away. Either someone is too stupid and keeps overlooking it...or too smart and knows that you can't remake something so classic.

There may be some people reading this who have never seen the movie. Hell, there may be many of you who weren't even alive when this movie came out. (and I literally shuddered as I typed that) And you must. I promise you, you won't regret 1 of those 97 minutes you spend watching that Saturday, March 24 unfold at Shermer High School. If nothing else, you'll see that Snooki and the Jersey Shore crew are totally ripping off Judd Nelson, obviously he originated the fist pump. If I was Judd...I'd be pissed.


And as a small side note...this is my 150th posting, damn I am getting old! :)

9 comments:

  1. A) This movie takes me back to overcast Saturday mornings in high school when I would watch this movie and B) Teen Witch falls under 80's Musical because, well, "I'm gonna be the most ppppoooopppppuuullllarrrrrr gggiiiirrrrrllllll".

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  2. Happy 159th, and Happy March 24th! I had no idea today was the actual date of detention. Cool!

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  3. This is one of my favorite movies. Have a great day honey!

    Did you hear my good news yesterday? Kori xoxo

    http://www.blondeepisodes.com/2011/03/wordless-wednesday-and-great-news.html

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  4. I love this movie sooo much! I can't believe it was written in just 2 days. How they managed to make 5 people in a room for an entire film interesting i will never know.

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  5. I love this movie! Didn't know today was the day of their detention... Always good to know stuff like that. Now I'll probably have to answer that question in a trivia game and I can thank you for it :) haha

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  6. Loved the Breakfast Club. It made me want to get in trouble. I also wanted to be a red headed Molly.

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  7. I love this movie too. I even had the horrible Molly ringwald haircut in fifth grade. I was a band nerd who tried to hide the fact I was in band so I could still be semipopular. Just loved music too much to quit!

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