On Watching The Breakfast Club with My Teenage Daughter

The iconic film The Breakfast Club was set in March of 1984, my senior year of high school. Remembering what it meant to me, I could hardly wait for my daughter to reach high school so I could share it with her. Rewatching it, though, I felt shocked by how much I had overlooked as a teenagerand proud that my daughter saw the films problems so clearly.

What made me love it then? John Hughes, who wrote and directed it, remembered high school more accurately than most adults. The Breakfast Club felt real. The knowing use of stereotypes spoke to the pigeonholing that teenagers, then and now, seem to impose upon themselves. Youre either a basket case or a jock, a princess or a brain. No wonder the films final voiceover, claiming the right to be all at once, felt liberating. The female characters parallel the maletwo popular kids, two outsiderswith one significant exception: there is no female equivalent of the nerd. The five teens interact with what strikes me now as corny melodrama--but that appealed, back when such strong feelings were still confusing and new.

My teenage self was in love with Bender, the abused delinquent, and certain that my love would have saved him. But his final nuzzle with Claire, the popular girl, was what offended my daughter most. Whats she doing with him? He was awful to her! she cried. And he was. I was startled by how awful, and by the fact that what was clearly sexual harassment to my daughter was forgiven, as proof of damageHed had a hard life!--by my teenage self. Benders verbal barrage creates the very definition of a hostile environment:

BENDER: Have you ever kissed a boy on the mouth? Have you ever been felt up? Over the bra, under the blouse, shoes off . . . hoping to God your parents don't walk in?

CLAIRE: Do you want me to puke?

BENDER: Over the panties, no bra, blouse unbuttoned, Calvins in a ball on the front seat past eleven on a school night?

When alpha male Andrew predictably steps in to defend Claire, Bender cries, Im trying to help her! Later, he calls her frigid. After all, shes not responding to his abuse. That must mean somethings wrong with her!

My daughter left the room for a snack because of the next gross scene, when Bender pressures Claire to reveal whether or not she is a virgin. Here, we almost seem in for a moment of unity. The female outsider, Allison, says: It's kind of a double-edged sword, isn't it? If you say you haven't, you're a prude. If you say you have, you're a slut! It's a trap. But forget sisterhood: Allison falls silent while the three boys gang up on Claire, badgering her until she answers. Only then does Allison reveal that she lied about her own level of experience. Of the boys, only the most powerless, the nerd, Brian, is similarly pressed. For the other two, their status is a given.

When Bender takes advantage of his hiding place under Claires desk to plunge between her legs (after a cringe-worthy shot of her crotch that we are forced to share), Claire hits back, but only with girl hitslittle kicks, and slaps on his back that would hardly sting. How the adult me longed for her to deliver a much heartier kick to his crotch. After all, he was perfectly placed for it. Yet after everything, Claire forgives him. And I had found the ending romantic! What modern girl would not see that Bender is just his fathers sexism, in hunkier form?

The whole Bender-gets-rewarded-with-a-princess theme is ridiculous in more ways than my daughter spotted. Whats Bender doing in the same school as the rich kids? His family wouldnt be likely to afford even to rent in the district. Its a good thing the movie ends soon after Claire gives him her diamond earring, and he places it in his own ear. We all know that the next shot would have been Bender talking to the police, after someone notices his new ear candy, and accuses him of stealing it. And good luck waiting for Claire to explain. Shes already said that everything will return to normal come Monday morning, when shell rejoin the popular girl posse and pretend not to know any of them, other than the jock.

Thats only the beginning of the films awkward engagement with class issues. Why is the poorest family the dysfunctional one? Did Hughes think drunkenness and abuse dont dare cross the threshold of middle-class homes? And where is Bender supposed to have gotten the brainpower for his clever one-liners, when both his parents are portrayed as brutally stupid? Is he a fortunate mutation? Or was it just too scary to contemplate that a smart parent could nonetheless be poor, drunken, and violent?

By 2017, its impossible, I hope, to watch a film without noting the oddity of an entirely white cast. This is meant to be a large high school outside of Chicago. Even if its an accurate representation of the time and place, we have learned by now the power of inclusive representation. For a movie that works so hard to show compassion for all, even the bullies, this is its most obvious failure.

So no, my daughter couldnt love The Breakfast Club the way I once had. But in exchange, she has an understanding of how girls deserve to be treated that took me at least ten years longer to reach. Lets hope that means less chance of becoming a victim--for her entire generation.