16 Candles Revisited

Ruthie & I were talking about John Hughes movies the other day, as someone was commenting on the classic title, The Breakfast Club. I mentioned that they wouldn't be bad to have on DVD if we saw them in a sale rack, so she picked up 16 Candles.

It's been awhile since I last saw that movie, but I remembered it as being cute and sweet and kind of funny. Megan wanted to watch it, so last Saturday we went downstairs to watch it on the big screen TV.

Well, I forgot the risque parts, which led to a few slightly awkward moments, but overall, it was fun to watch, and she liked the movie.

Time, memory, and a different life perspective, for lack of a better word, caused me to see the movie differently since I last saw it.

First, and of lesser substance, the good-looking jock who is the object of the main character seems way less cool now. He's still a jock, and has a single redeeming line when he tells his chin-up jock friend that basically, he's looking for a real girlfriend instead of the proverbial sacking. He's still very good looking, but his personality is pretty boring. What do you expect froma high school jock when you're my age?

What really captured me though was the daddy/daughter scene where the dad (played by the late Paul Dooley, which I always liked in his movies, especially in Breaking Away) apologizes for forgetting her 16th birthday. It's a soft, touching scene.

Now I have friends who are not parents who justifiably tire of the passive/aggressive dismissive line, "well, you're not a parent" they hear from people too lazy or just prone to egocentric dismissiveness to come up with something better when disagreeing on a parental issue.

That said, and this has no negative tone attached here, I would not have identified anywhere near what I did with the dad in that scene, and the feelings involved, if I was not a parent. Sure, intellectually, you get it, in the same way you understand prison is a bad place even if you haven't been to one. I just saw that scene now in a totally different perspective. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have identified so closely with the vibe of the scene from the dad's perspective in the way I did without actually being a parent.

Next up, Breakfast Club......