All right, which one did you think was you? Can you admit it? I don't think anyone who watched this movie - especially if you were a teen in the 80's - could come away from it without seeing a little bit of themselves in it.

John Hughes has an amazingly dead-on knowledge of what high-school cliques are about and he depicts it here. Five students are thrown together for all-day Saturday detention in the school's library. There's the princess, the jock, the geek, the burn-out and the nut-case.

But is that all there is in high school? Weren't there some people that crossed lines or went into two categories?

And that is the one main problem with the movie. The characters are so boxed in to their little part of the world that there is no point where the lines between them are blurred. I knew jocks who were also borderline geeks, geeks who were borderline nut-cases, and so on. I never saw it so rigid that there was no interaction between the cliques as he seems to depict in this movie.

But it is nice to dream about what being locked together for an entire day could do to a group of high school students. Could they learn and grow from each other? Hughes seems to think so.

The movie is also entertaining, with snippets that are as funny as they are poignant.

The day is presented realistically, and taken for what it is: one day. None of them knows what the future holds, and the movie ends without the promise of continued friendship. What it does end with is a nice slap at the principal of the school in the form of an essay about Who Do We Think We Are. In essence, it doesn't matter who they think they are, he will just slap his neat and tidy little label on them and deal with them in that stereotype.

This is a part that I thought he depicted quite accurately: the principal. I know in my school there were very caring teachers, but many of the teachers and administration were just going through the motions. They were either burned-out, merely looking to further their careers, or had gone into teaching for all the wrong reasons. The principal depicted here is obviously biding his time until some administration job opens up.

Oh, and I was the geek :-)


© 2001 Patti Aliventi

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older