Summer Movies--#7

As we continue strolling through summer films, we’re again in 1986, as we were last week with Stand by Me. And this film, too, is about friends and school. Sort of. In fact, it’s about trying to get out of school and school obligations. And get away from parents and parent obligations.

The kids in this film aren’t 12-year-olds, though, they’re teenagers in a typical high school.

And if there’s a film where opinions about it differ more widely, I don’t know what it is.

Time magazine’s reviewer, David Ansen, gave it a score of 100% and said “[this teen’s adventures] represent a teen’s dream to glory: to have, at one’s fingertips, the technical skills to sabotage the adult world’s machinery of oppression and, at the tip of one’s tongue, the perfect squelch for grownups’ moralistic blather.”

And the Wall Street Journal’s Julie Salamon gave it a score of 0% and said “[this is] one of the least appealing movies I’ve seen in a while… When a member of the audience belched loudly, that got the biggest laugh of the day.”

Take a look at a clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6gABQFR94U

Yep, it’s Ferris Bueller’s Day Off [1986] by John Hughes. And it’s a phenomenon—or, at least it is with high school students.

Last week’s dramatic Stand by Me, is certainly one kind of a summer movie—serious, introspective—and Ferris is another—wild and crazy fun.

This film knew its audience in the summer of 1986—kids who were sick of school and the rules it imposes and sick of the parents and the rules they impose… this film was a getaway film in its purest form—kids wanting to get away from the rules they were being told they should be living by. And get away they did.

In many ways, this film is a fairytale. How so? Well, it imagines what would happen if you could do and say what you want and have everything turn out well in the end. A teenager’s fantasy.

It’s interesting to think about how you might write a film with this premise today. Would it be just about skipping school? Maybe not, maybe it would be about misdirecting the parents so they wouldn’t be searching for you—tell them you’re doing one thing [going on a school trip, for example] when you’re really doing something else entirely—like taking your girlfriend and your best friend on a road trip of a different kind.

That’s the triumvirate in Ferris—he, his girlfriend, and his best friend… defying parents, school principals, and even maître d’s at fancy restaurants.

Summer movies are about fun, and that’s what Ferris aims to be—fun that teens can really relate to. Movie reviewers? Maybe not all of them. Me personally, not at all—to me it was a movie about slackers who think they know everything. But to the teenage audiences—this movie often takes on biblical status. To a large group of teens this movie really resonates.

Go figure. But hey, I wanted to include it because it’s not alone. Movies that show how right the kids are compared to the adults around them are often great summer fare. So if you’re thinking along those lines, go for it!

Copyright © Diane Lake

09Aug20

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