The CineFiles

Whew! That was a real long one! In fact, it’s almost twice the length of my normal comics pages. There was just so much cool trivia to include and even more that got left on the cutting room floor. For instance, did you know that actors Jami Gertz (a brat packer best known for 1980s teen vampire drama The Lost Boys), Brian Doyle Murray (brother of Bill Murray and veteran character actor), both Cusack siblings – John and Joan, and Zelda Rubinstein (diminutive spirit medium Tangina from 1980s horror classic Poltergeist) make cameos in Sixteen Candles?

I also tried to tackle the topic of gross racial stereotypes in Sixteen Candles, particularly the inclusion of Long Duk Dong, the Asian exchange student. It’s kind of painful to watch the performance now when I know I laughed as loud as anyone back in the 80s when I was an ignorant white kid watching the film. I lived in the suburbs and there was literally one Asian kid in my class at school.  This was my experience of Asians. Shudder. I’d have been 10 years old when the movie came out and I know I caught it on television (with all the expletives and bosoms removed but with plenty of racism left in) as a preteen. Considering that just a few decades prior, the horrible Asian stereotype character would most likely have been played by a white guy in yellow face with a set of buck teeth, squinting his eyes a la Mickey Rooney as Mr. Yuniyoshi in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, I guess the fact that Long Duk Dong was played by an actual Asian-American actor was progress? It’s still pretty uncomfortable viewing by today’s standards and I’m glad that, while there is still not nearly enough Asian-American representation in film and television, times have at least changed a bit for the better.  There’s also a great number of ethnic slurs made about older sister Ginny marrying into a family of “bohunks” which, happily, I did have to look up to know what they were talking about. So, again, maybe a sign of progress?

I also confess to some pretty strong feelings of “ick” around issues of harassment and sexual consent in the film.  I know that teenagers are horny and socially awkward, but there’s quite a bit of messaging going on that suggests that if you just keep creepily badgering a girl she’ll eventually like you and, even if she won’t go out with you, she’ll at least give you her underpants so you can give everyone the impression that you’ve had intimate relations. Eugh. And then do not even get me started on the issues of sex happening to drunk and passed out women in the movie. No wonder I was such a teetotaler, even in college – I think watching all of these teen movies made me spurn alcohol because of the “ha ha, she’s passed out, go for it” sexual shenanigans that seem to be endemic to 1980s comedies. Blech.

I’ll get off my social justice warrior soapbox now and say that, for an initial directorial effort, Sixteen Candles is still pretty funny and manages to have some real moments of sweetness in it, particularly the relationship between Samantha and her dad and then, of course, the ending which is pure teen girl fantasy ripped from the pages of Tiger Beat or Seventeen. If you’re just coming to the works of John Hughes, this is definitely not his best teen film – I’d go with sophomore directorial effort The Breakfast Club for that honor – but it’s still worth watching, especially as a time capsule peek at high school life in the 80s. The more things change…