"The Breakfast Club"

"The Breakfast Club" (1985) is one of those movies everyone must see before they die. Five kids spend a Saturday in detention. There's not much of a plot there. But it works. This is one of those "generational movies" people like to talk about. It's a story of growth, acceptance, and teenage angst. 

There's not a whole lot to say about this movie, really. It has some really funny moments, but overall is a very emotional movie. All five of these kids come from different walks of life and are a different high school stereotype. You've got Bender the delinquent tough guy (Judd Nelson), Claire the prom queen (Molly Ringwald), Andrew the jock (Emilio Estevez [EMILIO!]), Brian the geek (Anthony Michael Hall [who these days looks like he's killed people]), and Allison the outcast (Ally Sheedy). The movie is completely driven by the character interactions, and the early film is carried by Judd Nelson's Bender. That's not to say that everyone else is bad, but Bender is so charismatic that your eyes tend to be on him most of the movie. Once he gets everyone communicating, everyone else kind of takes off. 

As the movie progresses, these kids discover that each of them are not that much different from each other: they're all people trying to make it in this world. All of them have issues they are dealing with, they just deal with them in different ways. It makes you look at how you treat others for being different, and question why you do that. There may be a reason they're different from you.

I leave you with one of the most iconic moments in cinematic history:

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