“Don’t you forget about me”, the iconic lyrics to Simple Mind’s hit song from the 1985 teen film The Breakfast Club that encapsulates the attitudes of youth in the 1980s and never fails to rouse feelings of nostalgia, bringing me back to my teenage years. Much like The Breakfast Club, other concepts within narratives of John Hughes’ films are seemingly so simple and mundane, yet still manage to capture exactly what it means to be a teen; that is what makes Hughes’ teen films so unique and unforgettable.
Timothy Shary argues that before the wave of television, film was “the most influential entertainment medium in the world, shaping cultural notions about history, behaviour and values.” (2005, 1), and this has often been reversed too so that film has also been influenced by these entities. Hughes’ films are a time capsule, depicting trending themes of 1980’s youth culture and presenting them through teen characters and narratives. These films are at the heart of teen films of the 1980s and became quintessential of how youths and youth culture in 1980s America were constructed and presented within film during its time. Elissa Nelson writes that John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club (1985) “capitalized on a culture already targeting the youth market” (2019, 2) and this exploitation of youth culture and the increasing youth audience as a result of the rise of multiplexes and MTV, as well as exploitation of the shift to consumerist and commercialised content, was what made Hughes so well-known within the newly revived teen film genre.
It is because of these themes of youth depicted within Hughes’ work that I first became intrigued with his teen films, as being a teenager myself, I could resonate with these characters, attitudes and topics. But what are the traits of youth culture that are exploited within Hughes’ teen films of the 1980s? How do these teen films of the 1980s differ from teen films of previous decades? How did the socio-political landscape and youth culture of 1980’s America shape these films? Despite the numerous studies and analyses conducted on teen films of the 1980s, John Hughes and his films, there are limited studies on how various areas of youth culture is constructed and presented within Hughes’ 1980s teen films.
Therefore this dissertation will focus on an exploration of the socio-political climate of 1980s America, its impact on youth culture and the teen film genre in the 1980s, and thus explore the construction and presentation of youth culture as depicted within some of John Hughes’ most notable works The Breakfast Club (1985), Pretty in Pink (1986) and Sixteen Candles (1984). These three films have been selected as they feature various aspects of youth culture within their narratives which are distinct to the decade and span over the centre of the decade which will allow for an accurate analysis of how certain topics within youth was depicted in teen films at the time.
The methods in which research will be conducted are textual analysis and contextual analysis. This will entail studying the narratives, characters, themes and genre of the chosen case studies, as well as studying texts (books and journal articles) from key theoretical figures around the subjects of Reaganite America, popular and youth culture of the 1980s, the 1980s teen film and its themes, image of youth in teen films, and the case studies of The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink & Sixteen Candles. These key theoretical figures include Timothy Shary, Catherine Driscoll, Elissa H. Nelson, Thomas Doherty, Stuart Hall, Doug Rossinow and Rob Tannenbaum.
Chapter 1 will contextualise with a focus on the socio-political climate of the Reagan Era which shaped 1980s America and explore how the conservative values that encompassed this period of time consequently affected popular and youth culture in 1980s America. There will also be study on key aspects of the 1980s such as the rise of MTV and the multiplex, and how they consequently influenced popular and youth culture in the 1980s, thus influencing teen films within the decade.
Chapter 2 will define the teen film and discuss what a teen film entails through the works of various key theoretical figures within this topic. This chapter will focus particularly on teen films of the 1980s and explore the various themes often found within these films. In doing so, I will briefly discuss the ‘Brat Pack’, and their impact on the teen film genre in the decade as many of the actors featured in various coming-of-age films of the 1980s and were integral in shaping the characters of the 1980s teen film. Drawing upon context from the previous chapter, I will then argue and analyse why the teen film genre was so popular during this particular decade for its intended audience.
Chapter 3 will then take a close look at John Hughes’ teen films of the 1980s with analysis of The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles and the themes of youth culture found within these films. The key themes this chapter will explore are youth attitudes, class and sexuality with particular focus on youth’s distaste for authority and generational conflict in The Breakfast Club, class divide in relation to teenage love in Pretty in Pink and coming-of-age sexuality in Sixteen Candles.
Lastly, this dissertation will argue the extent in which The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles effectively utilised the topics within youth culture of the time to make them quintessential teen films of the 1980s. Through this, I will then identify areas where I can expand and further research within this area of film. I will also argue the extent in which John Hughes’ teen films of the 1980s present depictions of youth culture within the decade, and thus provides us a window into youth culture in the 1980s. To conclude, I will answer how youth culture of the 1980s was constructed and presented, with the issues of the socio-political climate and youth culture in mind within these John Hughes films.
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