The "Double-Edged Sword" of the Breakfast Club

Image IMDB publicity photo

We’re a movie-watching family with Gen X parents and Gen Z kids, but when my teenage son wanted to watch The Breakfast Club for the first time the other day, I had mixed feelings.

I let him know that while we love that movie, (it was iconic to the era after all!) it is problematic in ways that were not considered problematic at the time to mainstream society. And then we watched it.

I hadn’t seen it in quite a while, and it’s actually even better than I remember. AND YET.

There are issues with The Breakfast Club. And yes, they have something to do with the sexist behavior, namely —but not limited to — the scene where Judd Nelson has his face between Molly Ringwald’s legs without her consent. But it’s more than that.

While even at the time that scenario seemed problematic to me and others of my female teen cohort, in general, in our day-to-day life, we actually accepted all kinds of sexist behavior — including the type of verbal sexual and emotional abusiveness displayed by John Bender (Judd Nelson)— as typical of just guys “behaving badly”, and worse, even seeing these “bad boys” as attractive.

The context at the time, fully explored in the film, was that it was expected behavior because John Bender had a violent and abusive upbringing at home. So there’s a reason why he’s like that, and he really just needs someone to understand him so he can get better.

However, in the in-between 80s, mentors were hard to come by, and that someone was not a teacher, relative or mentor — as those people had all failed John Bender, and the rest of his cohort— but a woman.

Back then, girls like Claire Standish (Molly Ringwald) and Allison Reynolds (Ally Sheedy) were still being educated by the culture — including through films like this — to alter themselves, covering over any of their own flaws, so men would like them. And more than that — the men needed their goodness and beauty in order to deal with their own, sometimes fatal, flaws.

If a girl is the shy, “basket-case” Allison, she needs to become “pretty” so Andrew Clarke (Emilio Estevez) will then be able to like her. And her prettiness and sweetness will give him the self-confidence and strength to change himself for the better.

Or if she’s already considered “pretty” by the culture, then she should be “good” like Claire, who goes for a violent abuser because he’ll change and be a good guy because of her goodness, giving her a point to life. If she overlooks his violence and sees who he really is, deep down, then he’ll see it himself too and change for the better.

But these guys don’t change. It’s the girls who are changing, and not for themselves, but to fit the mold of what the guys want from them. They change their looks and behaviors, while the boys keep their flawed natures, and worse, are considered desirable because of them.

Women accommodate and center flawed men in the Breakfast Club (image IMDB publicity photo)

This is actually an interesting message about society. But here’s the issue: the film doesn’t seem to know it’s a message, it’s just advancing that behavior for real. Instead of showing how these postures don’t benefit either the boys or the girls, it thinks it’s giving them all a happy ending.

This missed point is one of the actual problems with The Breakfast Club.

The other is with Brian (Anthony Michael Hall), who is ostensibly the film’s protagonist, his narration beginning and ending the film. After writing the essay for the group, he punches himself in the arm playfully, as if to say “good job” to himself.

It’s new territory for him, to be happy with himself because of his talents. It makes him the sole character who has grown better over the course of the film — without the help of anyone —mentor, teacher, parent, woman or man.

While his newfound self-sufficiency might seem cool at first, it’s a very questionable (not to mention unrealistic) message.

The Breakfast Club was of its era. And it did hold a mirror up to the problems of white Gen X teens (and the failings of their parents, who admittedly left a lot to be desired). The message delivered was that people are all different, and teens should decide who they are, not the adults, which is great.

But it seemed to be missing a big point at the expense of the kids — especially the girls — of the era, which is that people need support from somewhere. And it shouldn’t be women changing themselves to help men advance.

Thankfully, today things are shifting a little, and we have films like Barbie now, to more succinctly show the implications of the ways men and women are viewed by and interact with each other, and how people in general grow during the course of their lives.

For some reason, I still love The Breakfast Club, but in the words of Allison Reynolds, “It’s kind of a double-edged sword isn’t it?”

Small Sparks

Haven’t seen Barbie yet but feeling Barbie-curious? Read my review of the film in the North Bay Bohemian.

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