80s in a nutshell

Rating: 10/10 (17 October 2006)

I truly don't believe there ever has been a better-made movie that captures so precisely what high school in the 80s (and now, probably) was like. The perfect representatives of each group, the struggle for popularity if not acceptance, finding the painful things that make us common, and the striking differences that drive us apart.
Hughes gets a bad rap for many of his movies, but this really is his finest work, IMO. It has everything - humor, drama, fight scenes, conflict, and resolution. More to the point, it has characters that everyone over 17 can identify with. If not, they at least recognize what makes up and drives the other characters since we basically grew up with all of them at our own high schools.
I'm certainly not going to say this was Emmy-worthy, but on a personal level this movie has been and will always be in my top 5 of all time. If you haven't ever seen it (or have only seen the watered-down version on broadcast TV) do yourself a favor and rent it tonight.