Sunday, June 12, 2016

Sixteen Candles Movie Review

Sixteen Candles (1984)
Rent Sixteen Candles on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: John Hughes
Directed by: John Hughes
Starring: Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Justin Henry, John Cusack
Rated: PG [PG-13]
Watch the trailer

Plot
Sixteen isn't always sweet, when Samantha's family forgets about her birthday.

Verdict
It's a teenage angst movie with credible, fully realized characters that don't succumb to the typical jock versus geek stereotype. It's part wish fulfillment and part human drama that's engaging and well written while capturing a snapshot of what it feels like to be a teenager.
Watch it.

Review
I've seen this before, and I'm still impressed with how many movies John Hughes wrote in the '80s and how many became classics. He was a machine.
Ratings were definitely different back then. Now, if you drop an "f-bomb", the movie is rated PG-13. This movie drops a bomb four minutes in and depicts a naked woman with a PG rating. It's rated the same as Minions (2015).
This movie is also from an era where offending anyone that wasn't a white male isn't a concern.

Samantha (Molly Ringwald) is turning sixteen, but with her older sister's wedding the next day, two younger siblings, and both sets of grandparents staying in her house, no one remembers her birthday.

It captures the memory of what it's like to be a teen. Everyday feels momentous, Samantha declaring this day the worst in her life. . The writing is pure teenage angst, but it's done so well. The teens talk like adults, and while many teen movies divide characters into stereotypical groups that can never interact, this movie subverts that.
Molly Ringwald in Sixteen Candles
Sixteen Candles - An adventure through the eyes of teenagers.

The geek, Farmer Ted (Anthony Michael Hall), and Samantha share a great moment sitting in a disassembled vehicle in a shop class during the school dance. They are open and honest, with Samantha pining for the popular Jake Ryan and Ted admitting he isn't the ladies man he claims. Both actors do a great job of effortlessly shifting between confidant and vulnerable. This is accentuated by great directing. Every character has little ticks, nods, or looks that convey how they feel. In so many movies, actors wait to deliver their lines. In this, the actors react to lines providing a lot of subtlety and depth.
In a genre where the female lead would either never interact with the geek or they would become a couple, this scene allows them to just talk. Despite being a geek, you root for Ted and his unwavering confidence.

Samantha has a crush on Jake Ryan, but instead of this being a make over movie or I really am in love with the geek movie, he likes her too. As nervous as Samantha is to approach the popular senior Jake, he's just as nervous to approach her.

Jake and Ted even interact. At first Ted assumes Jake wants to beat him up because that's what happens in these movies, but that's not it. Jake wants to ask him about Samantha.

This is fantasy to a large degree, but it's the imagined fantasy we wish happened in our teenage years. That's what this movie is, and it's why Hughes films were so successful. He's tapping into those imagined stories we wish we experienced.

The underrated teen film Can't Hardly Wait (1998) falls into the same category, feeling like a spiritual successor. If you like Sixteen Candles, you'll like that.

As much as I like this, Jake's comment of taking advantage of his drunk girlfriend or loaning her to Ted is terrible. There are numerous movies that glorify murder, but when a movie like this glories violating a female as an aspiration for teens, it's something I wish had been left out. It easily could have been changed.

Groups complain when a movie is insensitive, but I don't think anyone should derive their values from a movie. Of course what I think isn't fact. People do derive values from a movie. I've read reviews stating that the '80s were a different time, and that no one was offended back then. It's not that movies can't make fun of people, but Wantanabe's character is the only Asian in the film and he has no significant lines, reduced to a poorly imagined stereotype. That becomes a problem when Asians in film are played by Caucasians or are only depicted in a stereotypical manner.
I'm from the South, and many people assume that people from the South are confederate flag waving rednecks simpletons. This assumption is depicted in numerous films, and it is annoying. Exaggerate that to not just a geographical area, but an entire race. What happens when every depiction of someone like you is an inaccurate stereotype?

Should movies be censored, no. Should we be able to point out a poor depiction of a person, people, or other class of people, yes. The response to that shouldn't be, don't take it personal, it's just a joke, or it's a different time. Acknowledge a different point of view instead of dismissing it.

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