Director John Hughes

I chose to discuss the work of John Hughes.  I picked the films The Breakfast Club, Ferris Beuller’s Day Off, and Home Alone.  Hughes career is typically categorized under teenage rebellion/coming of age comedies.  He is clearly interested in this moment in his own life as well as the particular set of years between high school and college that teenagers go through.  He draws upon subject matter that we have all experienced and immediately can pull some type of connection or memory from.  If you haven’t made it to high school it might be an environment in which you base your perception off of.   When thinking about his own authorship it is difficult to pinpoint specifically a character in his films directly seeming more as a relatable blend of each person he has come across.  There are archetypes of rebels, slackers, bullies, prom queens, nerds, and jocks, roles not missing from any high school film ever made.  A difference you with Hughes’ films though as you continue watching though is that you began to empathize with each and every character.  There backgrounds and believability feel real and there is no reason to deny they aren’t that way for a reason.  It is clear that Hughes was just sitting back and observing everything for all his formative years, witnessing these clicks first in his own life. 

The main character, although not as easily identified in The Breakfast Club, seems typically adventurous with a little bit of a devious side.  They are out to stir something up.  There are characters in states of suicidal breakdowns and the parents hardly seem to exist if at all.  I think John Hughes has got to be a fan of Charles Schultz.  Even further the kids are nearly abandoned from parental figures.  The idea plot of Home Alone revolves around the parents leaving their child behind so he can essentially prove he doesn’t need them.   A certain importance that makes John Hughes films works of art has to do with the availability of each role he leaves for the viewer to fit into.   He is able to construct an environment of nostalgia and general respect for those coming of age years we’ve all had growing up.  As Cameron’s father’s priceless car roles backwards off the cliff we remember that time we broke an expensive vase at a friends house or popped our mothers exercise ball.  As Kevin is swinging from a window to his tree house or driving his video camera remote control car around we are reminded of building forts and playing spy.  He creates relationships and dynamics that bounce of each other, characters that need each other in order to keep themselves balanced.  Hughes seems optimistic about youth, he seems to believe in young people and ultimately is young at heart.   In Death of the Author, Barths said that the essential meaning of a work depends on the impressions of the reader, rather than the "passions" or "tastes" of the writer; "a text's unity lies not in its origins," or its creator, but in its destination.”  John Hughes takes inspiration from everything he has witnessed.  Hughes may want the film to be received a certain way or mean a certain thing but it is in fact what the viewer can take away and how they are affected.  The role of an author and his role as a director is to create the template for the audience to mold.