Breakfast Club star now looks at film with discomfort
For generations of teenagers, The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles have been a bittersweet ode to highs and lows of adolescence.
That trio of films made a teen icon out of Molly Ringwald and established the late filmmaker John Hughes' reputation as a visionary - however, the attitudes towards race and sexuality in those movies now trouble Ringwald.
Ringwald has penned an essay for The New Yorker in which she recalls how showing The Breakfast Club to her daughter recently brought up significant objections in light of the recent #MeToo movement.
(John Hughes)
Two scenes in particular trouble Molly, one in The Breakfast Club where burnout John Bender (Judd Nelson) inappropriately touches her character Claire Standish and yet gets the girl in the end anyway.
Another scene, this one in Sixteen Candles, played the question of consent for laughs when high schooler Caroline (Haviland Morris) is pawned off by her jock boyfriend on a geek for sex.
Her reservations over revisiting both films led Ringwald to take a deep dive into John Hughes' films and his writing for the National Lampoon. In the end, Ringwald says she came away disillusioned that some of the director's work could be deemed "racist, misogynistic, and, at times, homophobic".
"How are we meant to feel about art that we both love and oppose?" she asks. "What if we are in the unusual position of having helped create it?"
The actress also argued: "John's movies convey the anger and fear of isolation that adolescents feel, and seeing that others might feel the same way is a balm for the trauma that teenagers experience.
"Whether that's enough to make up for the impropriety of the films is hard to say - even criticising them makes me feel like I'm divesting a generation of some of its fondest memories, or being ungrateful since they helped to establish my career. And yet embracing them entirely feels hypocritical. And yet, and yet…"
In the end, Ringwald came away from this period of self-examination with the belief that this and future generations will re-evaluate Hughes' work and decide for themselves how much of it is still valid.
"The conversations about [the films] will change, and they should," she wrote.
"It's up to the following generations to figure out how to continue those conversations and make them their own – to keep talking, in schools, in activism and art – and trust that we care."
Rape Crisis England and Wales works towards the elimination of sexual violence. If you've been affected by the issues raised in this story, you can access more information on their website or by calling the National Rape Crisis Helpline on 0808 802 9999. Rape Crisis Scotland's helpline number is 08088 01 03 02.
Readers in the US are encouraged to contact RAINN, or the National Sexual Assault Hotline on 800-656-4673.
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