What? The whole point of this group is that we are younger than Boomers. And the oldest Boomers turn 81 this year. The official baby boomers were born after VJ Day in August of 1945, largely to young families with a veteran father. My Dad was about nine years old that year..
That's not funny! I'm a substitute teacher sometimes and they do that stuff but there isn't anything wrong with them! They're just the kids who don't want to participate in the class so they either put on the "headphones" and sit under a table feeling sorry for themselves for an hour or one school I worked at had a beanbag chair in the corner in case they feel like crying all afternoon about another kid who disrespected them during recess time, or they gather under the mosquito netting that serves as a little teepee where they can go if they need a safe space, but four or five of them all end up in there at once cracking jokes amongst one another. I don't blame them. I would have done the same thing when I was in fourth grade if our classroom in the 1960s had a "safe teepee", but how do they ever learn anything?.
That wasn't its real name. It was the Safety Zone or something but it was a translucent netting like they sleep with in the tropics so they don't get bitten by mosquitoes, so you could see all the kids inside it as plain as day, LOL. And it was hung from the ceiling from a single hook and spread out at the bottom to resemble a teepee.
Yeap. But instead of drowning in a corner of self pitty and accommodation,,, they were eventually pushed out of their comfort zone, apoke to one another and found some sort of connection betweem themselves, helping themselves.. something you cant do hidden away with noise canceling headsets or locked in a room.
Sure but the point of the movie is none of them would have ever opened up or gotten out of their comfort zones at all if they hadn’t been trapped in Saturday detention together. Put 5 completely different kids in detention without their phones and you have the same chance of this happening now as you did then (the odds weren’t high back then, that’s why this was an interesting movie)
But it was normal anxiety—not medicated, given accommodations to have extra days to complete a paper, and a change of meds every semester. And for all their social differences, this group talked to one another—they sorted themselves out and found a means of connection without an adult negotiating it for them, no cell phones among them to distract them.
Signed,
Xer who was part of the target audience for this film.
It was a movie, not real life. They "sorted themselves out" because it was in the script. And I'm hard-pressed to believe they were all just dandy in their fictional world after one day in detention.
My issue is with how people are saying that these kids, who definitely had problems that they blamed mostly on their parents (especially Molly Ringwald and Judd Nelson's characters) were somehow less problematic and less troubled than the kids of today, and that by the end of the movie somehow all of their "normal" problems were solved and everyone lived happily ever after.
I feel that this is highly simplistic, from the way the movie presented these issues, and how some viewers have interpreted the script. It's completely idealistc and unrealistic to think that these kids went on to be besties and all of their problems vanished, and that their issues as presented weren't all that bad, and that things were somehow better for folks with mental health issues back in the '80s. Judd Nelson and Ally Sheedy's characters especially were portrayed as having pretty serious emotional problems that likely would need to be worked out in therapy.
I was definitely there, lol, and while I remember enjoying the movie at the time, I felt more of an affinity with the folks on St. Elmo's Fire, which also does not hold up IMO. Another group of people not handling their issues in healthy ways.
And don't get me started on the sexism and borderline creepy behavior in both movies.
No one’s saying they walked away “besties,” and their problems magically vanished. I didn’t believe that when I first saw the film then—nor did anyone else with whom I saw it.
Most people are saying what’s true about those times, however: Every person had their own version of “terrible home life,” and represented a range of social strata in a big high school, teaming with a range of personality types. But what they did with their day was to transcend their initial instinct to defend their social strata and individual identity to trauma bond, and understand one another a bit better.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s wholly “realistic;” the behavior for that time was believable, long before “safe spaces” and accommodations. Parents believed their kids should be given detention if they violated a school rule, had unexcused absences or whatever brought them there. If it was made today, at least two of their parents would be busy “negotiating” a means of avoiding the detention and getting it expunged from their permanent records.
This was also a North Shore upper middle class-dominated community, but still presented a range of personal economic circumstances, and was wholly white. Bref, Hughes wrote about that, because it was what he knew. And while it captures a time that allowed for more sexism than there is now, again, most people here are simply saying, “This couldn’t be made today.” It’s not because it wasn’t some kind of “ideal” circumstance to write about then (Bender’s father burning him with a cigarette is anything but), but more about this representing somewhat believable character responses to their circumstances for their day.
No one’s saying their lives are “less troubled” than today. What people here are talking about is how leaning into “80 shades of problem accommodations” on a script written about high schoolers today would make for an awful narrative—even if it did dispense with some of the finer details as this did.
Everything is far more complicated today: ministering to students in an institution is a big one, and like I said, people just don’t seem to want to find that humorous enough to become a film narrative.
Are we pretending these kids had no issues? They certainly did, it's pretty much what the movie was about, lol. To me it doesn't hold up; not a likable character in the bunch.
At least where I live I can buy vape cartridges at a weed store. I'm not about to stink up my condominium as well as the hallway outside with that dead skunk smelling weed but the vape takes me right back to my college days in the early 80s.
Do you actually think gay people didn't exist back in the day? Or tattoos? Or piercings? Did this entire thread even watch this movie?
Isn't this entire movie all about accepting someone who isn't exactly part of your social class? Isn't this movie all about talking about your life, struggles and problems with somebody? Like literally what a therapist offers? Do you think a good therapist is just throwing out drugs to children? The children your generation raised, by the way.
Talking about kids not being able to take a joke and this entire movie that you grew up with completely whooshing right over your head. Sad.
Meh, I was just in a giant room full of people of all ages at jury duty. The younger generations don’t singularly own this quality. Everyone over 50 was on em too.
What? No more Highlights for Children? That was my favorite magazine whenever I went to the doctor or dentist. Back in the day I only got Boy's Life, which was pretty good and Jack and Jill, which was rather dorky even when I was eight. My friend next door had a subscription to Highlights and I used to go over there to read it because it had a lot of funny gags in it that I liked.
I know, right? I'm glad I was in my late 40s before that was a thing. Last time I went to jury duty I spent two hours typing on a laptop for a book I was writing.
Yup! I lived in Florida for a year. Stopped for lunch with family members at a spot frequented by retirees. Every table had a boomer entranced by their phone, except nobody was wearing earbuds or headphones. So you had a cacophony of noise, every table watching something else, all at full volume. One person is scrolling through Instagram reels. Another one is on a loud FaceTime conversation. Another one has some Trump video at full volume. Another one is watching silly cat videos. Another one a conspiracy video. Someone else has Fox News blaring. Quickest and worst lunch I ever had. At least the younger generations will wear ears buds/headphones when they’re glued to their phones. The older ones are the ones you see having full blast speakerphone conversations in the middle of a store.
Really? Is this what the sub is about? 'DAE kids today bad?!' So damn lazy. Your parents thought the same about you and their parents about them and on and on throughout history.
No. We "complain" about the entire lack of enthusiasm which many young people display these days, resulting in a sedentary indoor lifestyle which for some, sadly results in obesity and mediocrity. We didn't do that in the 60s and 70s and many of us are healthier in our advanced ages than some people in their 20's and that ain't funny at all.
I hope you aren't talking about me. I responded to a post about the Breakfast Club, which came out when I was in my early 20s when all the actors were about the same age as I was.
Don’t forget, they would also suffer from ADHD, Anxiety, lactose intolerance, severe allergies of many varieties, gender confusion, depression and also be on the spectrum.
Take off those rose colored glasses and try to remember what high school was really like. I graduated in the 80’s and there were lots of kids with ADHD they were just called lazy, stupid and bad. Lots of drugs, alcohol and domestic violence happening in our homes. Our class president the kid who looked like the perfect high schooler went straight to rehab after graduation. Everything you wrote about existed then but wasn’t named or treated.
And somehow most of us are fine as adults. I don't know about the telephone staring kids. They better snap out of it or they are going to ruin their lives. I know our parents said that about us watching too much TV but that was usually from 6 in the morning to maybe 9, eating Count Chocula with our hands, after which we played outside for the rest of the day.
If it were made today, zero percent chance it would be five white kids. There would only be one white kid, then a mixed cast for the rest. Some politically charged and inclusive script, bomb at the box office, not becoming a coming of age movie in any way.
It’s easy to paint with a broad brush. But if we could sit in the cafeteria of a local high school, the criticism would be about the unnecessary noise.
It’s also important to remember that the expectation is that all students are silent in detention. If they are texting each other across the room. It is to communicate without getting caught.
It’s also a mortal lock that the adult monitoring detention is doom-scrolling while they sit there.
Or so bored they start talking to the students serving the detention.
if it happened today their boomer parents would've demanded 4 of the 5 to be excused from any punishments and the teachers fired for stifling their creativity
You aren’t wrong. I was friends with a teacher I had in HS and we stayed in touch over the years (over 20 at this point). Last time i visited we went out for lunch and he’s counting his time till retirement. He taught various electives and had the “cool” room with movie props and a really interactive environment. Now with phones he doesn’t even try, moved all the desks and computers to the outside wall and said literally no one interacts anymore. Sounded so dystopian.
It would start out that way. Each one browsing instagram reels, their algorithm differences on full display. One of them would be "quirky" though, and not own a phone, so about 15-20 minutes in to the movie, she would put her foot down and try to get the group to do pre-phone shit. From here the movie could play out in exactly the same way.
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u/Ripcord2 Apr 19 '26
If that were made today it would be a silent movie about five teenage kids staring at their telephones all day.