A few years ago I wrote an article reviewing
teen comedies from the
1980s. When I made my list of
movies to review,
The Breakfast Club was at the top. I was excited at the prospect of watching it again; TBC rocked my world when I was
seventeen, and this would be the first time I'd seen it since I was a
teenager.
As my wife and I watched it, I was dismayed to find that the movie no longer exerted the power over me that it had when I saw it back in the day, not even a little bit. It came across as an overwrought high school play, and I don't mean that in a good way. Oh it was all right, I suppose, but my expectations had been so high that the actual viewing experience was a real letdown.
At one point, however, roughly halfway through the film, a character came on stage whose presence in the story I had completely forgotten. Whereas my 17-year-old self had identified with the detention-bound kids, this character truly spoke to the adult me.
I have to admit that I no longer identify with the brain, the basket case, the princess, the jock, or the criminal.
I identify with the janitor.