SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL (1987)

High school "loser" (Eric Stoltz) pines away over cool girl (Lea Thompson) while being completely oblivious to the fact that his best friend (Mary Stuart Masterson) is totally in love with him.  If that sounds familiar it's probably because it's pretty damn close to the story for the previous year's Hughes/Deutch collaboration PRETTY IN PINK.  The main differences are the sex roles are reversed, the tone is more serious and all the quirky little things that made PRETTY IN PINK entertaining are removed.

If it was 1987 and I was a twelve year-old girl, I would have probably found Stoltz's tender heart to be endearing, but as a pissed off adult here in good old 3058, I found the entire thing to be completely unbelievable.  Especially the ending.  Wow!  Talk about a complete 180.  Anybody who's seen this movie knows what I'm talking about.  [SPOILERS!!!] Stoltz is one-hundred percent focused on the cool girl for the entire film, even spends his life's savings to buy her a perfect date and then right when everything, and I mean everything, turns out right he walks triumphantly out of the big party with the cool girl all hot and bothered over him and then by chance he catches a glimpse of his best friend's eyes looking just a little moist and boom...I've been in love with you the entire time.  The End.  Say what?[END OF SPOILERS!!!]

Mildly entertaining 80's high school love film, but I was really distracted by how old everybody looked and just the fact that the story was so unoriginal.  Not a bad film and I don't regret watching it, but there's much better stuff out there for you to spend your time on.

SIXTEEN CANDLES (1984)

"That's why they call them crushes. If they were easy, they'd call 'em something else."

Now this is more like it!  After kinda getting a little down from watching PRETTY IN PINK, I revisited SIXTEEN CANDLES and now I feel awesome!   I think I'm gonna go party with the Donger, put a pizza on a record player, dance to some Oingo Boingo and wreck my Rolls Royce.

Average high school teenager Molly Ringwald is superbummed that her family is so wrapped up planning her older sister's wedding that they forgot her 16th birthday.  Even worse, the hunk that she's secretly in love with doesn't even know she exist...or does he?  One thing's for sure though: the local geek/wannabe stud knows that she exists and he hits on her nonstop.

I'm not sure if SIXTEEN CANDLES is the single best 80's high school movie or not, but it's up there.  It's certainly one of the most influential, right along side FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH and THE BREAKFAST CLUB.  I know for me as a sexy teenager in the 80's I watched the fuck out of this movie.  Watching it again now after not seeing it for a number of years I was kinda surprised at how well it's aged.  I was also impressed by the intricacies of Anthony Michael Hell's performance.  He was really good.  Were all of those little touches instructed by John Hughes or did he just do them?  Like when he knocked over that loaded down rack of car parts and in an effort to rectify the situation he moves that one little part over closer to the larger pile.  Haha.

SIXTEEN CANDLES might not be for the more grumpier members of the No Fun Club who point out things like, whenever the great Long Duk Dong appears on screen you here a gong clanging or some of the more cruder sexual comments.  I just look of it as an ugly product of the times and that's how people talk.

A wide cast full of great characters, tons of quotable lines and memorable scenes, 80's fashion overload, otto-mo-biiiles, superfast pace without a single dead scene, shower scene, expensive floppy disks, headgear on.  Highly, highly recommended.