John Hughes
127 connections found
View:
Connections, in both directions
Hot Tub Time Machine (2010)
Directed by Steve Pink
influenced by Sixteen Candles (1984), Weird Science (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), The Breakfast Club (1985)
Plot
Those who lived through the decade of Duran Duran will smile at the sly homages to classic '80s flicks like "Sixteen Candles," while those who weren't even twinkles in an eye will enjoy the "rager gone wrong" premise.
How could Pink, for example, not include a reference to "Sixteen Candles" or another of Cusack's memorable '80s movie?
Hot Tub Time Machine was ostensibly directed by Steve Pink, but it was really born from the collective unconscious of the 34-45 demographic—the viewers for whom the movie will deliver the most reliable pleasure, as they tease out the embedded references to Sixteen Candles, Revenge of the Nerds, Better Off Dead.
With the exception of a few movie references?the dialogue and one-sheet from 1984's "Red Dawn" is recalled; a romantic scene is staged to mimic 1984's "Sixteen Candles," and go-to '80s bad guy William Zabka (1984's "The Karate Kid") gets a familiar sort of role?and a handful of time-specific jokes (one girl asks what e-mail is, while a walk-on character carries a cell phone the size of a large brick), "Hot Tub Time Machine" really doesn't take satisfactory advantage of its time-travel storyline.
While there may be laughs to be had for audience members who grew up in the 1980s – “what’s email?” – it’s simply not good enough to just throw in references to Sixteen Candles when they’re not funny.
Instead, it quickly becomes clear that the film is more in tune with the dumber films of the era--the plot is essentially a mixture of the idiotic jiggle-fest “Hot Dog: The Movie” and the garish John Hughes gumdrop “Weird Science” with chunks of “Back to the Future” as a garnish.
Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Directed by Jon Watts
influenced by Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), The Breakfast Club (1985), Sixteen Candles (1984)
Characters Visuals Themes
Even Zendaya’s Michelle, an outsider equal parts The Breakfast Club’s John Bender and Allison Reynolds, seems to take an interest in Peter Parker.
They released a teaser trailer and a photo that paid homage to The Breakfast Club .
Meanwhile surly Michelle— Disney Channel’s Zendaya doing an inspired take on Ally Sheedy’s character in The Breakfast Club ’s— refuses to enter the Washington Monument because slaves may have built it.
And as much as it wants to capture the nostalgic frisson of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “The Breakfast Club,” the new Spidey movie is too obligated to the Marvel Universe to truly pull it off.
This high school crew rounds out this fresh film well and provides an on-screen bond reminiscent of actual high school students, giving a nod to the John Hughes golden age films we saw in The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
Además, sabemos que Jon Watts buscó inspiración en grandes clásicos como The Breakfast Club y la memorable serie Freaks and Geeks ; por eso es perfectamente natural -y tal vez imperceptible- para nosotros que Zendaya haya calcado a la Linda Cardellini más cínica.
The DUFF (2015)
Directed by Ari Sandel
influenced by The Breakfast Club (1985), Sixteen Candles (1984), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Plot Themes
The film makes an early reference to The Breakfast Club, and we can feel it desperately seeking to fall in the same iconic territory.
“The DUFF” has the decency to acknowledge its roots in the great John Hughes teen movies of the 1980s—even beginning by referencing the five high school types stuck serving Saturday detention together in “ The Breakfast Club ,” which recently celebrated its 30th anniversary.
Adapted from a novel by Kody Keplinger, whose website says that she wrote the book as a senior in high school, “The DUFF” begins, in an apparent nod to “The Breakfast Club,” by informing us that teenage stereotypes have changed: “Jocks play video games, princesses are on antidepressants.”
In fact, there are specific references to things like The Breakfast Club or Sixteen Candles all throughout the movie.
“The DUFF” references predecessors like “The Breakfast Club” and “Can’t Hardly Wait” with wit and humor.
The first three quotes are all lifted from reviews of The Breakfast Club.
Central Intelligence (2016)
Directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber
influenced by Sixteen Candles (1984)
But they make a good enough duo, and Johnson — who can be a lug in by-the-numbers blockbuster fare such as “San Andreas” — is a riot as a character whose bulging masculinity is softened by his love for unicorns (“I’m big time into ’corns!” he brags, while practically tearing through his unicorn emblazoned T-shirt) and John Hughes’ “Sixteen Candles.”
He prizes hugs and unicorns, his favorite movie is “Sixteen Candles,” and whenever the subject of high school comes up, he looks like he wants to crawl under a desk.
Far too many of the one-liners in “Central Intelligence” contain references to pop culture, from Taylor Swift’s love life to “Road House” to “Sixteen Candles” to Jake Gyllenhaal to Denzel Washington to a thuddingly unfunny moment in which Hart is told he looks like “a black Will Smith.”
The combined effect is a good one, especially because Johnson is particularly amusing, whether he’s reminiscing about the greatness of the film “Sixteen Candles” (“I’ll never be like Molly Ringwald,” he pouts) or giving into physical affection (“I’m a hugger!” he proudly proclaims).
Johnson may be enjoying a comic breather in between his contributions to the “Fast & Furious” franchise, but here he’s playing the rare character you might actually care to see in a sequel — a professional undercover killing machine who, deep down, remains the same shy, sensitive, traumatized, “Sixteen Candles”-obsessed worrywart he was in high school.
Sporting a fanny-pack and jorts, and loving unicorns (“the most lethal animal”), “Road House,” and “Sixteen Candles” in equal measure, Johnson’s delightfully dorky Bob may have bulked up since high school, but he’s still endearingly sweet, even if to a fault.
Bumblebee can be described as The Breakfast Club meets Transformers.
There are a few chuckles to be had about Alf being appointment television viewing, the sheer number of band shirts Charlie seems to own, Judd Nelson’s fist pump at the end of The Breakfast Club, and nods to the Transformers animated film and a throwaway Go-Bots gag that will leave fans of the old school series in stitches, but overall they feel like they exist for the sake of being there, not for any particular function.
And “The Breakfast Club” proves its pop culture immortality with yet another invocation — “Bumblebee” only ever uses less than a minute of the film, but it does so repeatedly and as the punctuation of key moments.
She turns eighteen in the brief span of the story, which is set in 1987 and features a recurrently explicit tribute to “The Breakfast Club.”
She confides in him the hurt of losing a loved one and shares the rebellious majesty of The Breakfast Club.
(Bumblebee is a big fan of The Breakfast Club, but he doesn’t like the Smiths or Rick Astley.)
Hence, about two-thirds of “Power Rangers” feels more like “The Breakfast Club” with a science fiction twist, and things don’t really get going until the third act of the movie.
Taking a page from “The Breakfast Club,” he meets two of his future teammates in detention: Kimberly (Naomi Scott), a mean girl brought low by her gossipy ways, becomes the Pink Ranger, while the Blue Ranger is Billy (RJ Cyler), a nerdy, lovably awkward tech whiz.
Power Rangers’ faction of screenwriters will be happy to hear it if this mismatched collective reminds you at all of The Breakfast Club, as bonfire powwows and parables about the valor of unity serve as the film’s lifeblood from beginning to end.
This is basically The Breakfast Club with super powers.
Even though “Power Rangers” doesn’t provide anything new to “The Breakfast Club” formula, its willingness to explore the adolescent experience in any way is appreciated.
Throughout the course of this overlong 124-minute sci-fi action-adventure/coming-of-age superhero dramedy, “Power Rangers” pays homage to, attempts to replicate, or simply steals from “The Breakfast Club,” “Thor,” “Chronicle,” “Transformers,” “Pacific Rim,” “Children Of Men,” “Iron Man,” “Spider-Man,” 2009’s “Star Trek” and maybe “Gods Of Egypt.”
Easy A (2010)
Directed by Will Gluck
influenced by The Breakfast Club (1985), Sixteen Candles (1984), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Themes Plot
It’s a loose-fitting tribute to say the least, considering how Royal doesn’t actually understand what he’s referencing (pointing out Ferris Bueller’s parade-hijacking burst of joy as a “random dance number,” and proclaiming Bender’s triumphant fist pump at the climax of “The Breakfast Club” as a celebration of his romantic conquest).
Chivalry and decency are repeatedly valued and this nostalgic longing hearkens back to plenty of ‘80s teen comedies in the same vein, including Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Say Anything... Olive even name-checks John Hughes directly.
Hughes’ classics are referenced frequently; music – even a clip – from ”The Breakfast Club” plays) as well as other seminal 80s teen films (”Cant Buy Me Love”, ”Say Anything”), ”Easy A” is a light but nicely crafted comedy about a young girl who (Similarly to Ronald Miller in ”Cant Buy Me Love”) lies her ass off to be popular.
It implies that it's putting an Internet-age spin on the old standards by explicitly referencing teen-movie landmarks like Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, and Say Anything — and by "explicitly referencing," I mean it actually splices shots from those movies into the proceedings, a bid for reflexivity that screenwriter Bert V. Royal and director Will Gluck lack the chops to support.
With films like The Breakfast Club , Sixteen Candles and Ferris Bueller's Day Off , Hughes tapped into the inherent drama of high school with comedy and warmth.
But after a single viewing of the smartly written and directed Easy A, I feel safe in saying that, just as with 16 Candles , The Breakfast Club, and Ferris Bueller, it's a movie I know I'll be unable to resist watching whenever it pops up on cable TV - no matter how many times I've seen it.
Charlie Bartlett (2008)
Directed by Jon Poll
influenced by Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Characters Themes Plot
Back in the day, it seemed, everybody wanted to be Ferris Bueller, that coolly rebellious teen played so perfectly by Matthew Broderick in the John Hughes classic "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."
The movie smells like "Catcher in the Rye" and some of its loose offspring, like "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," and, in particular, "Rushmore," especially after we find out the public-school principal (Robert Downey Jr.) is a self-loathing drunk who likes to wallow by his swimming pool the way Bill Murray did in "Rushmore."
Like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Charlie Bartlett becomes, in its exploration of the troublemaker who’s so attuned to his generation that he exemplifies all that defines it, a satire on how that generation was shaped by its elders.
Big question: Can “Charlie Bartlett” succeed in its obvious attempt at combining “Rushmore” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”?
With a flip of the detention slip to Rushmore and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, the high school comedy Charlie Bartlett brings a bit of realism - kids on drugs, kids smoking, kids having sex - that doesn't usually make the grade in the genre of addled adolescent angst.
The role of "Charlie Bartlett" requires a charismatic, magnetic young actor someone along the line of "Ferris Bueller's Day Off"-era Matthew Broderick.
The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Directed by Kelly Fremon Craig
influenced by Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Themes Visuals
Like with Juno and The Breakfast Club, this is a film that will leave you laughing and crying thanks to its genuine sense of heart, humour, wit and pathos.
It’s visible in every detail from the damp autumnal setting to the way Nadine’s style veers between Judd Nelson in The Breakfast Club and a grungier Cher from Clueless.
What’s so refreshing about “The Edge of Seventeen” is how expertly it upends all the tired tropes of teen comedies, ranging from “Love Finds Andy Hardy” to “The Breakfast Club.”
And the Lord did then give us Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink, and lo, it was good.
The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller's Day Off are tinged with magical realism, seen through the eyes of the teen who's got the grown-ups' number; Heathers (1988) is a very dark comedy with the trappings of a revenge thriller, and the adults are basically nowhere to be seen.
Given that the genre has a pretty good record overall (Sixteen Candles, Clueless, Freaky Friday, Mean Girls), this wouldn't be too shabby.
Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life (2016)
Directed by Steve Carr
influenced by Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Themes
Channeling the spirit of John Hughes and playing like a tween version of Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life delivers an easily digestible and amusing portrait of youthful hijinks that should well please its target audience.
Movies such as “Better Off Dead” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” have done a great job of bringing the high school experience to surreal life, but “Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life” has left the junior high nightmare untapped.
This fantastic hybrid of High School Musical and Over the Edge is destined to become a cult classic for Generation Z in the same way that Heathers and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off were for Generation X.
That is, of course, except for Mr. Rooney in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."
Gluck doesn’t have the easy, boundless charm that Matthew Broderick did in this film’s spiritual predecessor “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” but he has sweet, obviously affectionate relationships with his mother Jules (Lauren Graham, of "Max" ) and his younger sister Georgia (Alexa Nisenson).
Although its illustrative breakouts, sibling rivalry and endless pranks invites comparisons to the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, it actually more closely evokes the works of John Hughes, especially Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Breakfast Club, with its emphasis on "stopping the fun being sucked out of childhood".
Calling it a "riff" on Body Snatchers is, if anything, not strong enough: for the first two-thirds of the movie or better, it's virtually nothing besides the exact plot of Body Snatchers populated by the same cluster of generic teen characters who've inhabited every single teen movie since John Hughes codified them in The Breakfast Club .
This film is a clear nod to both "The Breakfast Club" and the classic "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", a blend that actually reminds of "Scooby Doo" sans the dog!
Unlike with The Breakfast Club (or any of the Body Snatchers films, for that matter), there is little reason for our protagonists to establish connections at the start.
But, more surprisingly, it also pays homage to "The Breakfast Club."
"The Faculty" is his latest screenplay put to film, and while the concept is slyly clever -- take the kids from "The Breakfast Club" and drop them in to "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" -- and kicks up some of his still-hot embers, after outlining the gimmick he wrote the rest of the movie on auto-pilot, pausing only to pack it with his spot-on, stock-in-trade pop culture references.
Here he essentially plugs The Breakfast Club into Invasion of the Body Snatchers and lays an alien invasion at 90210 High.
To All the Boys I've Loved Before (2018)
Directed by Susan Johnson
influenced by Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985)
Themes Characters Plot
This helps contribute to the film's overall sense of innocence, which in turn calls back to the inherent sweetness of classic '80s teen films like Say Anything... or Sixteen Candles .
Even more impressive is the feat achieved of keeping the goody-two-shoes heroine sympathetic throughout without making her drop her moral standards, unlike, say, the heroines in Clueless or Mean Girls , two obvious touchstones here along with John Hughes movies such as the namechecked Sixteen Candles .
For instance, the fake couple trades must-see favorite movies, Sixteen Candles for Fight Club, as they shake on their contractual agreement.
Based on Jenny Han’s beloved YA novel by the same name, the movie centers on the life of Lara Jean Covey ( X-Men: Apocalypse ‘s Lana Condor), a shy high school student who’d rather watch Sixteen Candles on a Friday night than try to find her Jake Ryan in real life.
Lara Jean’s devotion to Sixteen Candles (despite the flat-our racist Long-Duk Dong that she rightly calls out) puts the viewer fully into a John Hughes frame of mind, which is a good place to be, because we haven’t had a consistent string of John Hughes movies in quite a while.
Conceived as a kind of “Sixteen Candles” for the Snapchat generation, this endearing Netflix Original offers an honest, unsentimental take on the mating lives of hormone-addled high school students, earning extra points for casting Asian American actress Lana Condor in what would have been the Molly Ringwald role.
Booksmart (2019)
Directed by Olivia Wilde
influenced by The Breakfast Club (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), Sixteen Candles (1984)
Themes
Because of the film’s timeless message, Booksmart evokes the pantheon of teen/college comedies that come to define generations: Fast Times at Ridgemont High, The Breakfast Club, Dazed and Confused, 10 Things I Hate About You, and, yes, even Superbad.
Dever and Wilde have both compared the film to John Hughes’s The Breakfast Club in interviews and Wilde screened Fast Times At Ridgemont High for the cast the day before they commenced shooting.
It’s a delightful little miracle in its way: a The Breakfast Club (1985) message smuggled inside an outlandish Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) package.
Booksmart is a teen dramedy that lacks the razor-sharp wit, intelligence and delicate blend of comedy, drama and satire found in coming-of-age films like Mean Girls, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Ghost World, Clueless, Heathers, The Breakfast Club and many more that have managed to transcend their own genre to become timeless classics or cult classics.
The alumni include John Hughes (The Breakfast Club), Amy Heckerling (Clueless), Reginald Hudlin (House Party), Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused), Diablo Cody (Juno), Daniel Waters (Heathers), Sofia Coppola (The Bling Ring), and Cameron Crowe (Say Anything).
En este viaje el guión de Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Susanna Fogel y Katie Silberman (sumar sus experiencias merece un texto extra) las enfrenta a sus propios hombres de paja, a su león cobarde, a su ser de hojalata a través de los cuales Amy y Molly comprenderán su propio valor en medio de toques de comedia que a veces nos llevan a la camaradería del Trainspotting (Reino Unido, 1996) de Danny Boyle y otras al humor gamberro y mordaz, inclemente y veloz de las comedias de David y Jerry Zucker (“we’ve done it a vagillion times!”), para después ajustar las tuercas y dar la vuelta a la camaradería que surge del imposible como en The Breakfast Club (EUA, 1985) o la que se refuerza en el imposible (esa fiesta en el bote,) como en Arma mortal (EUA, 1987).
Dope (2015)
Directed by Rick Famuyiwa
influenced by Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), The Breakfast Club (1985)
Themes
It’s edgier than Hughes’ pictures ever were, of course—the passage of two decades have seen significant cultural change—but it has much the same affectionate perspective on teen misfits, and even ends with a personal statement reminiscent of the one Brian Johnson (Anthony Michael Hall) delivered at the close of “The Breakfast Club”—though this time, of course, it’s delivered on video rather than paper.
Actually, the strongest connection I see is to John Hughes films like “The Breakfast Club” or “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” escapade-fueled teen films with a surprising amount on their minds.
It's a bit of John Hughes ("Ferris Bueller's Day Off," "The Breakfast Club") mixed with vintage screwball comedies.
The story’s lead trio of misfit friends are “deeply obsessed with ’90s hip-hop,” yet “Dope” owes more to such white-cast teen movies as “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “The Breakfast Club” than to such later, grimmer, youth-skewing “urban” films as “Boyz n the Hood” and “Menace II Society.”
"Dope" isn’t exactly "The Breakfast Club," "Risky Business" or "Do the Right Thing," and yet in many ways it is.
Similar to The Breakfast Club, Dope will be the go-to film for this generation of millennials.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)
Directed by Stephen Chbosky
influenced by The Breakfast Club (1985), Sixteen Candles (1984)
Themes Visuals
Even without the music, baby boomers and Gen Xers will fondly recall any number of director John Hughes’s character-driven ensemble dramadies, such as The Breakfast Club.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower recalls dozens of high school movies from Fast Times at Ridgemont High to Lucas to The Breakfast Club to Mean Girls and so on...
Teen angst is a well-worn topic on screen, and prone to both critical dismissal (Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series) and captivation (John Hughes' The Breakfast Club).
High School in the late 1980’s and 1990’s bore little resemblance to the hyper-stylized version portrayed by John Hughes in films like The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink.
You’ve seen it all before, from Holden Caulfield to “The Breakfast Club” to “Degrassi High”: misfit teens in suburbia having wee existential crises, massive unrequited crushes, and emotions no one else has ever felt before.
All I can say with any certainty is that Chbosky’s Perks is the first film in far too long to stand shoulder to shoulder with Hughes’ The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink and Some Kind of Wonderful – screenplay bibles for emotionally adrift teenagers.
The love story goes nowhere, only serving to make a weird, self-serving parallel to one of the all-time great teenage comedies, “The Breakfast Club.”
One wishes the filmmakers had found room for more rough-edged oddities as this and spent less time borrowing goodwill from The Breakfast Club (and so soon after Easy A pulled the same act).
Beca develops a friendship with Jesse (Skylar Astin) from the rival group, and their friendship grows over his insistence that she learn to appreciate the classic John Hughes movie “The Breakfast Club.”
A scene where Kendrick and male lead Skylar Astin sort records is cheesy in the extreme, but it doesn’t half bring a smile to the lips, as does his undying love for John Hughes’ classic 80s film The Breakfast Club, the significance of which Beca doesn’t immediately comprehend.
And it's not even good John Hughes (like The Breakfast Club , which is explicitly acknowledged).
The story is pure formula, but, like Jesse's love of 1985's "The Breakfast Club," that's okay as long as there are well-observed characters to care about and a savvy soundtrack to compliment them.
Ruby Sparks (2012)
Directed by Jonathan Dayton
influenced by Weird Science (1985)
Themes Plot Characters
The nature of creativity and desire, the alchemy of the imagination and the power of will, the relationship between creator and created - it's a theme that has raised many questions, from Pygmalion to Play It Again, Sam; from Weird Science to Frankenstein.
Rather than being Stranger Than Fiction with insightful gender politics, Ruby Sparks is more a hipster Weird Science (John Hughes, 1985).
Even presuming that Calvin’s on libido-suppressing antidepressants, Ruby’s a curiously asexual construct for a man in his late 20s — this redhead’s got less erotic heat than the fantasy woman concocted by a pair of teen nerds in “Weird Science’’ (1985).
Not for Kazan the male fantasies of " Weird Science ," in which two panting teenage boys create a swimsuit model, or even "Splash," with Tom Hanks teaching his pet mermaid everything she knows.
That blend of Weird Science poured through a Charlie Kaufman meta-filter is what nudges this one helpfully into SFX territory.
The Perfect Score (2004)
Directed by Brian Robbins
influenced by The Breakfast Club (1985)
Plot Themes
The dialogue in "The Perfect Score" mentions " The Breakfast Club ," which is nice.
The results are a retread of The Breakfast Club dressed up as a caper flick.
"The Perfect Score," a suspiciously stale MTV Films production, references "The Breakfast Club" about midway through, and the movie's few good moments echo the spirit of existential, youthful rebellion captured by that 1985 minor classic.
In fact, Francesca jokes at one point that they should all get real and dish about their feelings, � la The Breakfast Club --which is indeed what they end up doing.
A remake in quality and spirit of the "what were they thinking" classic Hackers, Brian Robbins' The Perfect Score is one of those stunted adolescent teensploitation flicks that makes one pine for the suddenly-glory days of Fresh Horses and The Breakfast Club --which, as it happens, seems to serve as this flick's carbuncular muse.
Similarly, it tries to blend movies such as The Breakfast Club (the characters roughly correspond, with one left over), Mission Impossible and Ocean’s 11, with little success or originality.
Long ago, in the age of Dustin Hoffman in “The Graduate” and Woody Allen in “Annie Hall,” right up through the farcical social misfits of the 1980s (Anthony Michael Hall in “Sixteen Candles,” etc.), Hollywood’s freaks and geeks had an undertone of self-hatred.
Love, Simon (2018)
Directed by Greg Berlanti
influenced by Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Themes
But unlike the mostly-white, suburban enclaves of movies like Sixteen Candles, the students and teachers of Love, Simon feel a little closer to the real thing.
And if the title recalls the British romantic-comedy smash “Love, Actually,” it’s for good reason, although “Love, Simon” has more in common with those cherished but overrated films of the late John Hughes (“Sixteen Candles,” “Pretty in Pink,” “The Breakfast Club”) than those of Richard Curtis.
It’s filled with familiar coming-of-age milestones, developments and emotions, and characters that could’ve easily jumped from Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off into the 21st century.
Love, Simon doesn't quite reach the heights of teen movie classics like Say, Anything..., Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, Clueless, Mean Girls or The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but it comes close enough to be one of the best American romantic teen comedies in recent memory.
All the other “Grease” and “Sixteen Candles” archetypes are here, too: The bullies, jocks and popular kids, the wacky administrator (played oddly over-the-top by Tony Hale), and the no-nonsense drama teacher (Natasha Rothwell, as much of a hilarious standout here as she is on HBO’s “Insecure.”)
And if the title recalls the British romantic-comedy smash “Love, Actually,” it’s for good reason, although “Love, Simon” has more in common with those cherished but overrated films of the late John Hughes (“Sixteen Candles,” “Pretty in Pink,” “The Breakfast Club”) than those of Richard Curtis.