Samantha Edmondson
Daily Egyptian
Starring: Molly Ringwald, Michael Schoeffling, Anthony Michael Hall
Director: John Hughes
Running Time: 1 hour, 33 minutes
Gus Heads: 4 Gus Bode Heads
When a young girl wakes up on the morning of her 16th birthday, there is one main thing on her mind - her breasts.
Girls are told from 9 or 10 years of age about the significance of the "sweet sixteen," a magical transformation from pre-adolescence into womanhood during the 16th year of physical development.
The girls believe as if suddenly their bodies would take shape overnight and their dreams of dating their crush, getting a car, and essentially gaining high school popularity would come true with the stroke of midnight.
"Sixteen Candles" pits young female adolescents into the real life playground of making high school dreams come true on your 16th birthday.
For most pre-adolescent females like Samantha Baker (Ringwald) in "Sixteen Candles," the dreams are not reality. Baker thinks her continuing flat-chestedness will be the major worry, but that discovery is what her family, friends and classmates notice instead of her 16th birthday.
In his debut film, director and writer John Hughes escapes from the prior '80s cheap-shot jokes and perverted sensibility of movies such as "Porky's." Instead, he shows how humor can be found in one girl's journey to be noticed among a hierarchy of physical and social labels.
Attention for her sweet sixteen is dampened from the start after Baker's sister, Ginny (Blanche Baker), turns the family's focus toward her wedding planned for the next day.
Baker is shocked to see her family forget about her birthday, take over her room, disregard her school lunch and, above all, treat her like a 15-year-old.
Already bummed about her failed developmental growth, Baker is eager to escape from her grandmother's comments of her perky breasts and fondling to her invisible status at school.
But the day worsens as her popular and athletically built crush, Jake Ryan (Michael Schoeffling), picks up a juicy questionnaire Baker dropped on the floor for her best friend, Randy.
Ryan discovers Baker's interest in him, even though his prom-queen girlfriend, Caroline, is perfectly sculpted and has already received her sweet sixteen-body transformation.
As Baker plans for the big Friday night dance, her family, still clueless of her problems, wonders why she should stay home and celebrate. Instead, her grandparents pushed a foreign exchange student staying with them, Long Duk Dong, onto their granddaughter.
At the dance, Baker and Ryan continue to cross paths, but after a repeated musical entrance of the Dragnet theme, Baker's stalker, Ted "The Farmer" (Anthony Michael Hall), embarrasses his love interest, marking a low point in the evening for the 16-year-old.
The movie follows a path of wild after-dance parties, heartbreak and make-ups, and a total classifying and declassifying of physical and social high school stereotypes.
"Sixteen Candles" allows 16-year-old girls everywhere to connect with moments that make up their real high school experiences: having a crush, wanting a car, fighting off geeks and hoping to fill their training bras.
Even though Baker may have gone through the worst birthday of her life, Hughes attempted to break down the hierarchy of high school physical status. And he made one point clear by the end of the movie - size doesn't matter.
Samantha Edmondson can be reached at sedmondson@dailyegyptian.com.
Published on 11/17/05; 12:24:44 PM
