My 16 candles for John Hughes, R.I.P Friend

Three films that inspired Love Song
1. Some Kind of Wonderful (written by John Hughes)
2. Singles (written & directed by Cameron Crow)
3. Love Actually (written & directed by Richard Curtis)

Of the three films, Some Kind of Wonderful had the bigger influence on Love Song;
The love triangle, the girl musician, the clueless best friend and of course the happy ending.

John Hughes has had an even bigger impact on my life than I thought. His passing has affected me deeply. How could the death of a person I did not personally know leave me feeling so empty? And then it hit me, I did know him or rather he knew me and he knew me well. David Edelstein on his blog, The Projectionist said it best, “John Hughes, captured for a generation of kids (largely white, middle- and upper- middle class) how it felt to be marginalized, misjudged, alienated from parents, and alone in a crowd of so-called peers”. That was me and most of my generation growing up.

It bothers me that almost every article I’ve read describes his audience as largely white, middle- and upper- middle class. My girlfriends and I dreamed of Jake Ryan and Ferris Bueller driving across the George Washington Bridge and taking us on the dream date of a life time. We did not let socioeconomics get in the way of our celluloid fantasies.

That’s not to say that some of my friends have not chastised or questioned my love for this man’s films over the years. “There are no brown people in his movies” or “the characters are affluent” or “they live in Chicago” and my favorite “how can you relate to any of it”. My answer was, “I like his work, his movies make me feel good”. Sometimes that’s all it takes.

Watching his films as an adult, I realize what drew me to his work, what makes stop channel surfing if I stumble onto one of his gems; in the end, the outcast gets his/her happy ending and I love that. Those are my favorite kinds of movies, commercial or independent, the story of the outcast/outsider/underdog has always appealed to me especially if the outcast/outsider/underdog gets a happy ending.

My least favorite of his films is Pretty in Pink (he wrote and produced). Why? Because she ends up with Blaine when she should have ended up with Ducky. The 16 year old in me was rooting for Blaine but that’s my point, the movie sends a bad message. However, I think this one has my favorite soundtrack, music from Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark, The Psychedelic Furs, New Order, Echo & the Bunnymen, The Smiths, it’s heaven.

Mr. Hughes’ films rarely got the respect he deserved. Perhaps posthumously his critics will come to understand and appreciate his work and what it meant to people like me.

We are almost done with the film - Coming to a festival near you in 2010.

xoxo,

Lucy