The brilliant John Hughes writes teenagers phenomenally well. The characters in The Breakfast Club, unlike a lot of other high school comedies, are three dimensional, complex, likable, engaging, and played by wonderful actors who own the screen.
Hughes' direction is also very good here. I particularly loved the way Hughes introduced the students, each one introduced by how much of a ''reprobate'' they were.
The pace, for the most part. is spot on. The film never ceases to entertain, but it is more than just entertaining. By the third act of the film you really start to dig deep into who these characters are, ironically, the subject for the essay they are supposed to write. The scene where they are all talking about how they got in trouble is funny, yet heart breaking at the same time. This is a juxtaposition we as film fans rarely get in the Teen-comedy genre.
And that is what I love most about The Breakfast Club: the fact that it is not your average teen comedy. It has been imitated but never replaced. Films like 10 Things I Hate About You, Mean Girls, and last year's The Edge Of Seventeen, are great, and do come close, but there is something about The Breakfast Club that resonates so much more. Still, to this day, teens watch it and find themselves relating to the characters. I think that is 100% due to John Hughes's verisimilitude writing.
The characters in The Breakfast Club are kids we all have known, and that is what makes them still, even in 2017, some of the most relatable teenage characters ever put to screen. To add further, all of them are distinct from one another. Bender, the too cool for school stoner, Brian, the always in his books kid who fakes his ID so he can vote, Claire, the popular girl who wants to stand up to her popular friends, Allison, the ''weird'' outsider, and Andy, the charismatic jock, are all completely different and interesting. This makes it possible for pretty much every audience member to feel connected to at least one of them. That wouldn't be enough without good writing. Thankfully, Hughes was up to the task.
The film's ending is the only mild weak spot for me. The ending comes rather abruptly, and I think that is a script issue. The flow felt unfocused in the last 5 minutes, as if Hughes and company were, unnecessarily, hurrying to wrap it up.
Maybe on future viewings the end will feel a little more swift, but as of right now, considering how well paced the rest of the film was, it was a tad jarring. Speaking of the ending, albeit iconic, there is one thing that happens between two characters that I found to be mildly inconsistent with the rest of their behaviour in the film.
But other than those minor flaws, which both happen in the last 5 minutes of the film, so that's lucky, The Breakfast Club is easily one of the best teen comedies ever made.
It is a clever, witty film, that thanks to a perspicacious script, will live forever.
Sammy's Score: 9.5/10
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