In Case You Missed It #7: The Breakfast Club: Has it Aged Well?

 In "The Breakfast Club", five teenagers with wildly different personalities and subcultures are sent to detention for a variety of different reasons. Ultimately they learn to respect each other in this environment while also realizing they are very similar in a lot of different ways. 


The Breakfast Club is an older movie (circa 1985) and maintains an impressive air of dialogue and solid filmmaking even to this day. While obviously not socially perfect (Bender is admittedly a bit sexist, at least at the beginning) the film manages to balance different subcultures while acknowledging their similarities in many smart ways through dialogue and music. 


The soundtrack remains iconic today (who could forget about me (or the song "Don't you forget about me") and the dialogue is similarly up-to-par. The writing manages to humanize the teenage characters while also being funny, revealing, and above-all naturalistic (we believe what they say like we believe what friends and family members say, circumstantially). 


The film is a little sexist (as I mentioned earlier) and some of the gross-out humor hasn't aged well (some people might object to teenagers smoking marijuana or swearing at all). However, I do not believe the vulgarity in any way takes away from the seismic impact it did (and should) have. 


If you're into socially relevant movies from the 1980s that humanize teenagers, then this might well be your pick. If you're turned off by vulgarity in language, I understand, but I believe enough people can enjoy this to move past its more unsavory elements. 


Listen to my podcast on The Breakfast Club at patreon.com/posts/40776680 


Thank you and goodbye. 

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