R.I.P.: John Hughes

I have a confession to make: I actually haven’t seen the majority of John Hughes’ work. That’s right: no “Sixteen Candles”, “Weird Science”, “Some Kind of Wonderful”, and many more. Then again, the ones I did see couldn’t be more perfect indicators why this guy will hold his place as a god of the Teen Movie. “The Breakfast Club”. “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. “Pretty in Pink”. Of course, I worshipped both “Home Alones” as a kid, but seeing those previous three films later on stuck with and affected me, often in ways I couldn’t quite get.

There’s an interesting, slow-burn kind of quality to his movies—the more you think about them, the more you digest the characters who probably aren’t even the stars, the more it moves you. I saw “Ferris Bueller” when I was 12, and I so badly wanted to be Matthew Broderick’s friend. I knew I could never be that cool, but, man, would it be awesome to have a guy like that backing me up when things got tough. The guy who’d remind me to not take myself too seriously, to go out and have some fun—to live. But here’s the thing: as much as I loved Ferris then, Cameron’s the one that fascinates me now. It’s really his journey in the movie, and watching that unfold, watching him gain the confidence to turn his life around, is perhaps the greatest pleasure of the wish-fulfillment-like classic.

And that’s Hughes’ genius. This guy understood teenagers—he made them heartbroken, hopeful, weird, foolish, funny, awkward—you know, real people, with believable issues…and they stood the test of time. Those movies weren’t shallow, one-joke premises—they didn’t reduce teens to horny, single-note caricatures. The writing was strong, funny, but with charm and heart that rarely felt tacked on. The problems in “The Breakfast Club” are still relevant, the romance in “Pretty in Pink” still incredibly sweet (Duckie will forever be one of my all-time favorites…but, yep, I was secretly rooting for Blaine), and Cameron in “Ferris Bueller” is still one of the best and most touching bits of character work that I’ve seen.

So, thank you, John Hughes—I can’t wait to watch the rest of your films, but the ones I was lucky to see still mean a lot. Maybe one day, I’ll have the guts to sing “Twist and Shout” and rock out the entire Chicago city parade! True, that might not happen (especially knowing me), but at least that moment is forever captured on the magic of film.

My thoughts go to his friends, family, and his many, many current and future fans.

"Breakfast Club" image courtesy of Universal Pictures.