Pretty in Pink Movie Review

There’s a real timelessness in John Hughes’ films that center on teenagers that belies the sometimes terribly dated fashions and soundtracks that accompany his stories. The opening montage of Pretty in Pink (written by Hughes, but directed by Howard Deutch) screams 80’s. The blaring saxophone of The Psychedelic Furs’ title song screeches over a scene of Andie (Molly Ringwald) getting ready for school in the morning. She crafts her own clothes, which look a lot like a blend of New Wave and post-punk. Later there’s James Spader as the wealthy yuppie Steff with his linen trousers and blazer, collared shirt unbuttoned halfway down, and his flowing blonde locks. Andie’s childhood friend Duckie Dale (Jon Cryer), who is not so secretly crazy for her, is a pure original fashion statement, but distinctly dated to the period.

25 Years Ago This Month: February 1988

This was not a particularly interesting month of movie releases. There are new films from John Hughes, Wes Craven, and Roman Polanski, and Spike Lee's sophomore effort, but nothing that really awed critics or audiences. And not a single thing that has really survived a quarter century later beyond the odd pick-up off a rental shelf (or queue in today's parlance).

*movies I've seen

Apprentice to Murder starring Donald Sutherland and Chad Lowe doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. I can't track down any reviews other than Kevin Thomas's in the L.A. Times (he gives it a mixed to positive review), it has only 221 votes on the IMDb, and it's not in the Netflix database. Talk about movies that time forgot!

The Serpent and the Rainbow is a zombie chiller from director Wes Craven and starring Bill Pullman. It's got a rotten rating at Rotten Tomatoes, but only just. The blurbs are mixed with some critics calling it Craven's best film to date and others calling it pedestrian or too trumped up with effects.

*She's Having a Baby is one of John Hughes' lesser efforts with Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth McGovern as a young married couple and the trials and tribulations of trying to conceive.

Some Kind of Wonderful Movie Review: 25 Years Ago This Month

Some Kind of Wonderful is often compared to Pretty in Pink as being a retread of similar material. Both were written by John Hughes, that master of writing teen characters in the 80s, but I think the similarity between the two is superficial. It’s true that both films are about class divides in American high schools. Both are about a teen from the poor side of town who falls in love with a rich kid. But Hughes, in his way of probing beneath the surface, uncovered different layers in this telling.

25 Years Ago This Month: February 1986

January and February are typically where studios dump their garbage because people just don't go to the movies during those winter months. Maybe because there's only crap to see. Hmmm. Valentine's Day is an excuse nowadays for unleashing some insipid romance film, although 1986 seems not to have one.

The two biggest earners that opened that month were Woody Allen's Hannah and Her Sisters which took in $40 million and John Hughes' Pretty in Pink (also $40 million). The latter was a favorite of mine when I was a teenager of course (as were all the Hughes brat pack films of the 80s). Hannah and Her Sisters is a favorite of mine in adulthood and it resides in my personal DVD collection.

In February 1986 Chuck Norris started the Delta Force franchise. If you care.

Anyone remember Wildcats where Goldie Hawn becomes a high school football coach? Well it went on to gross $26 million and features the film debuts of Woody Harrelson, Wesley Snipes, Mykelti Williamson and LL Cool J.

Incredibly, though 9 1/2 Weeks with Mickey Rourke and Kim Basinger in the flesh is well known now, it grossed a mere $6.5 million at the time.

Pixar Animation Studios, now the most successful animation studio in Hollywood, responsible for such hits as the Toy Story franchise, Finding Nemo and Up, opened its doors for business. Their first short film, Luxo Jr., ended up providing them their logo.

On the 21st, Shigechiyo Izumi died in Japan. He was purported to be the oldest living person, dying a few months before his 121st birthday.

The Soviet Union launched the space station Mir on the 19th.

25 Years Ago This Month (August 1985)

*Clicking the label "1985" below will take you to a list of all posts related to movies of that year including other "25 Years Ago This Month" entries.

August 1985 was the month of teen comedies with the release of the John Hughes comedy Weird Science in which geeks Anthony Michael Hall and Ilan Mitchell-Smith create Kelly LeBroc from a doll. I used to watch it a lot as a kid, but it's a lesser Hughes film.

Next up was Real Genius, still one of my favorites, starring Val Kilmer and Gabriel Jarrett as two super geniuses at a super genius school unwittingly designing a new powerful laser to be used as a military assassination weapon.

Fittingly, time has not been kind to My Science Project starring Dennis Hopper as a hippie high school science teacher whose students bring him a glowing orb they found which can transport them to different times and places. Yeah, you didn't miss much.

Another classic from my childhood released this month was Better Off Dead with John Cusack as a recently dumped, suicidal teen who screws up each suicide attempt. Sounds hilarious, doesn't it? It really is though. And it's totally bizarre with the two Asian characters who learned their English from watching Howard Cosell on "Wide World of Sports" and the paperboy who chases Cusack around for the "Two dollars!" he's owed.

Less classic was Teen Wolf. Despite starring the hot-at-the-moment, fresh off the release of Back to the Future, Michael J. Fox, this film only took $33 million. It was enough to be #1 for August releases but only 26th for the year.