Kelly Fremon Craig
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Sixteen Candles (1984)
Directed by John Hughes
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Music Characters
Given that the genre has a pretty good record overall (Sixteen Candles, Clueless, Freaky Friday, Mean Girls), this wouldn't be too shabby.
From what I’ve been told, films like Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles were great representations of the high school experience of that decade.
When Nadine accidentally-on-purpose runs into her crush, Nick, in the tropical fish aisle, the glow is Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet and the soundtrack is Spandau Ballet’s “True,” made famous at the school dance in Sixteen Candles.
A terrific teen comedy with the traditional feel of John Hughes’s Sixteen Candles and Pretty in Pink, The Edge of Seventeen stars Hailee Steinfeld as Nadine, a 17-year-old high-school misfit whose best and only friend starts to date her smug, perfect older brother.
It’s an easy comparison, as “The Edge of Seventeen” was plainly inspired by the iconic ’80s teen comedy “Sixteen Candles.”
For instance, her love interest is her dorky Asian best friend, a role traditionally relegated to the wacky sidekick, like Long Duk Dong in “Sixteen Candles.”
She sent it off to iconic producer James L. Brooks ( Terms of Endearment , Broadcast News , Jerry Maguire ) and hoped it get really, really lucky.
Craig working alongside producer James L. Brooks feels like a marvel: the man responsible for Terms of Endearment and Broadcast News brings a gravitas often lacking from teen fare (at least, lacking since the days of John Hughes), and Craig brings a fresh and singular perspective.
The Edge of Seventeen contains some frustrating elements, like its nondescript visual aesthetic (excluding Carla Hetland’s costume design and William Arnold’s production design, both of which are superb) and an overly sentimental prologue that recalls a similarly unnecessary one in Broadcast News, directed by The Edge of Seventeen producer James L. Brooks.
This is the man who directed such films as Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, and As Good as It Gets, produced Cameron Crowe’s Say Anything and Jerry McGuire and created or produced TV classics including The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Taxi and The Simpsons .
As a filmmaker himself, Brooks has made movies like “Broadcast News” and “Terms of Endearment” that perfectly balance comedy and drama, big laughs and emotional honesty.
It’s reminiscent of James L. Brooks, the man behind “Broadcast News” and “Terms of Endearment,” who writes flawed characters with love and understanding.
Having been produced by filmmaker, James L. Brooks ( Terms Of Endearment , As Good as It Gets ), it’s no surprise that The Edge Of Seventeen has that classic clutch movie quality.
She sent it off to iconic producer James L. Brooks ( Terms of Endearment , Broadcast News , Jerry Maguire ) and hoped it get really, really lucky.
Craig working alongside producer James L. Brooks feels like a marvel: the man responsible for Terms of Endearment and Broadcast News brings a gravitas often lacking from teen fare (at least, lacking since the days of John Hughes), and Craig brings a fresh and singular perspective.
This is the man who directed such films as Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, and As Good as It Gets, produced Cameron Crowe’s Say Anything and Jerry McGuire and created or produced TV classics including The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Taxi and The Simpsons .
As a filmmaker himself, Brooks has made movies like “Broadcast News” and “Terms of Endearment” that perfectly balance comedy and drama, big laughs and emotional honesty.
It’s reminiscent of James L. Brooks, the man behind “Broadcast News” and “Terms of Endearment,” who writes flawed characters with love and understanding.
Clueless (1995)
Directed by Amy Heckerling
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Plot Themes Characters
The structure gets wonky when she runs out of ideas, even sending Nadine to the playground and then to the yogurt shop for many minutes to have a kind of epiphany, à la Cher’s moment in Clueless — Amy Heckerling has her heroine strolling by well-timed fountains and getting distracted by designer sales (her passion) as she comes to realize she’s in love with her ex-stepbrother.
“The Edge of Seventeen” will most likely become the equivalent high school cult-classic for girls (in addition to “Clueless”) that “Dazed & Confused” is for boys.
If you’re a filmmaker trying to make a movie about teen girl angst, you better damn well have something new or original to say, because you’ll always be competing with classics like Mean Girls , Clueless , and even Fast Times at Ridgemont High .
Pitched somewhere between the double-edged wit of Clueless and the rawness of Confessions of a Teenage Girl , The Edge of Seventeen ’s whip-smart script is simultaneously uproariously funny, heart-breaking, and keenly observed.
Steinfeld is stunning as the lead in a role that’s alternately heartfelt and hilarious; she’s the center of the film and the movie is unthinkable without her, the same way Alicia Silverstone was essential to “Clueless.”
In the best teen films, from “Sixteen Candles” to “Clueless” to “Superbad” to the greatest high school movie of the last ten years, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” the main characters have a way of occupying the moral high ground.
The Breakfast Club (1985)
Directed by John Hughes
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
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.
With this follow-up to a first feature-length script (the lackluster “Post Grad”) Craig has armed herself with one of the best films of 2016, and one of the best coming-of-age stories in the past 20 years.
This is the directing debut for Kelly Fremon Craig, who previously wrote the entirely forgettable 2009 comedy Post Grad .
The Edge of Seventeen is a delightful and honest teen comedy with a mature soul, written and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig (who also wrote the Alexis Bledel coming-of-age comedy Post Grad ).
Fremon Craig (whose main credit prior to this was as writer of the poorly received Post Grad ) doesn't try anything big or bold visually, and that's fine; she knows how to keep things moving.
Kelly Fremon Craig, surprisingly, the writer of the awful, plastic-fake Post Grad (2009), makes her directorial debut here with a great deal of understanding and love.
Director and screenwriter Kelly Fremon Craig — who wrote 2009’s Post Grad , which was an object lesson in how not to tell stories about young women in the same way that Edge is a master class in getting it right — smartly tweaks the limitations of a low budget into that timeless vibe.
Mean Girls (2004)
Directed by Mark Waters
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Plot Characters
Given that the genre has a pretty good record overall (Sixteen Candles, Clueless, Freaky Friday, Mean Girls), this wouldn't be too shabby.
Nor does it much resemble some of the more high school-centric teen comedies of the last several years, such as “Mean Girls” and “Easy A,” in part because Nadine so deliberately limits her interactions to those within a very small circle.
And while its tone is closer to the earnestness of John Hughes’ 1980s films than the bawdy zingers and pratfalls of Mean Girls or The To Do List , The Edge of Seventeen finds humour in a specifically feminine flavour of rage, yearning and humiliation.
Fifteen years later, a few bright spots ( Mean Girls , Juno , The Spectacular Now ) haven’t quite dispelled the sense that the Venn diagram between angsty white teenagers and meaningful art has drifted into two non-overlapping circles.
If this was Mean Girls , she'd be both Lindsay Lohan's Cady Heron and Rachel McAdams' Regina George.
Ghost World (2001)
Directed by Terry Zwigoff
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Characters
Like “Ghost World” and “Heathers,” other movies aimed at smart girls and their older sisters, Craig’s film will find its cult following as its audience catches up with it.
The Edge of Seventeen may not be embraced by John Hughes nostalgists, but Steinfeld's Nadine is a direct descendant of Molly Ringwald's Samantha in Sixteen Candles — as well as of the marginalized heroines played by Winona Ryder in Heathers , Julia Stiles in 10 Things I Hate About You , Thora Birch in Ghost World and many others.
Craig owes a lot to the works of John Hughes and movies like Ghost World and Mean Girls , but she still puts a very personal spin on the genre, and Steinfeld gives a fantastic performance that matches up to her breakout turn in True Grit .
Pretty in Pink (1986)
Directed by Howard Deutch
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Characters Themes Plot
With the best of intentions but few regrets, Nadine would probably devour a definitive teen icon such as Molly Ringwald's Andie Walsh from Pretty in Pink , John Hughes' 1986 masterpiece.
A terrific teen comedy with the traditional feel of John Hughes’s Sixteen Candles and Pretty in Pink, The Edge of Seventeen stars Hailee Steinfeld as Nadine, a 17-year-old high-school misfit whose best and only friend starts to date her smug, perfect older brother.
And the Lord did then give us Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink, and lo, it was good.
That was the heyday of John Hughes: Molly Ringwald was Pretty in Pink and Matthew Broderick would soon take the day off as Ferris Bueller.
As Mr. Brumer, the school’s long defeated English teacher, Harrelson ranks up there with such unlikely and welcome teen movie supporting players as Harry Dean Stanton in “Pretty in Pink” and the tag team of Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci in “Easy A.” Mr. Brumer is Nadine’s barely-there rock — the fellow sadsack who will sit there and silently sit through her epic complaint jags, piping up only to offer deflating non-advice or a withering quip.
Like “Pretty in Pink,” Craig’s obvious inspiration, Nadine is presently presented with a love-struck, tongue-tied nerd she refuses to give the time of day.
Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)
Directed by Amy Heckerling
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Characters
Those that do stand out — Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Say Anything…, the films of John Hughes — often become generational classics.
More directly, thank Kelly Fremon Craig, whose directorial debut confronts millennial teens with the same authenticity and verve that helped “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” jumpstart a revolution when it crash-landed into the ’80s.
There is a short list of high school films that can grasp and accurately depict the pain, anguish and heartache of the teenage experience: “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” the works of John Hughes, “Mean Girls,” “Easy A.”
She’s not like Jennifer Jason Leigh’s naive Gen X’er Stacy in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High.”
If you’re a filmmaker trying to make a movie about teen girl angst, you better damn well have something new or original to say, because you’ll always be competing with classics like Mean Girls , Clueless , and even Fast Times at Ridgemont High .
Over the past 40 years, Fast Times at Ridgemont High , Dazed and Confused , Can’t Hardly Wait , American Pie , and Superbad have had huge impacts on the moviegoers growing up with them.
Nor does it much resemble some of the more high school-centric teen comedies of the last several years, such as “Mean Girls” and “Easy A,” in part because Nadine so deliberately limits her interactions to those within a very small circle.
Some are light like Juno and Easy A whereas others are heavier such as Thirteen and The Perks of Being a Wallflower .
A fresh and singular female perspective – The Edge of Seventeen’s most recent analogue is the terrific Easy A, another tale of an offbeat and angry teen girl, but one that’s written and directed by two men.
Unlike the plot in “Easy A,” which expects viewers to believe that Emma Stone can’t get a date, Nadine isn’t cosmetically an outcast.
For her work, Craig has cited the comedies of John Hughes, who was also the source for Easy A, another strong modern high school film.
It is that, and as such, it reminds you of the usual suspects, from 16 Candles to Clueless and Easy A .
Heathers (1989)
Directed by Michael Lehmann
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Characters
Like “Ghost World” and “Heathers,” other movies aimed at smart girls and their older sisters, Craig’s film will find its cult following as its audience catches up with it.
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.
For Winona Ryder’s dweebette-by-association Veronica Sawyer, 17 is when she fell in with bullies, cliques, and much, much worse in Heathers (1988).
The Edge of Seventeen may not be embraced by John Hughes nostalgists, but Steinfeld's Nadine is a direct descendant of Molly Ringwald's Samantha in Sixteen Candles — as well as of the marginalized heroines played by Winona Ryder in Heathers , Julia Stiles in 10 Things I Hate About You , Thora Birch in Ghost World and many others.
In the pantheon of hard-R teen comedies, The Edge of Seventeen hews way closer to Heathers ’ sly subversion than the locker-room boob bonanzas of Porky ’s.
It’s immediately obvious that she is cut from the same cloth as her old man, and the young actress brings something out in Harrelson in the same way that Hailee Steinfeld did in last year’s The Edge of Seventeen.
With his performances in The Edge of Seventeen and Wilson, Woody Harrelson reminds us of his gifts not only for comedy, but for finding the inner childlike innocent in even the prickliest of characters.
He does more with his supporting turn in last year’s The Edge of Seventeen than he does with the entirety of Wilson, and that’s because Wilson feels far more contrived.
Harrelson is most functional as an outsize supporting player; witness him hitting home runs as a cynical high school teacher in "The Edge of Seventeen," coloring alongside Matthew McConaughey's crazy in "True Detective" or going gregarious as a Twinkie-obsessed apocalypse survivor in "Zombieland."
But if anyone can make such a character not just amusingly tolerable but even somewhat sympathetic, Woody Harrelson —who rarely gets his proper due for his vital contributions to movies ranging from the "Hunger Games” franchise to last year’s “ The Edge of Seventeen ”—would be a good choice.
Those that do stand out — Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Say Anything…, the films of John Hughes — often become generational classics.
Edge of Seventeen comes under the aegis of producer James L. Brooks, whose got a good nose for this kind of thing; in 1989, he put his stamp of approval on Cameron Crowe’s directorial debut Say Anything , and seven years later, he lent a hand to Wes Anderson’s first feature Bottle Rocket .
Having been produced by filmmaker, James L. Brooks ( Terms Of Endearment , As Good as It Gets ), it’s no surprise that The Edge Of Seventeen has that classic clutch movie quality.
This is the man who directed such films as Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, and As Good as It Gets, produced Cameron Crowe’s Say Anything and Jerry McGuire and created or produced TV classics including The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Taxi and The Simpsons .
“Edge of Seventeen” is produced by James L. Brooks, the genius who has put his human stamp on projects ranging from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” to “The Simpsons” to “Broadcast News” and “As Good As It Gets.” “The Edge of Seventeen” is his first film project in years, and it’s worthy of his name; it carries his grace and elegance throughout.
Perhaps the Twitter community seized on my spontaneous Lady Bird love because I compared the movie to The Edge of Seventeen, a cult-favorite 2016 high school dramedy starring Hailee Steinfeld, who — like Kristen Stewart, Jennifer Lawrence, and countless other young actresses — has a posse of fans who patrol social media, looking to shout down haters and signal-boost praise.
"Lady Bird" is this year's "Edge of Seventeen."
Familiar teen-movie fixations — disposal of one’s virginity, trying to get into the cool crowd, attending prom — help drive the story, but Lady Bird is much more soulful and poignant in its comedy than the usual offerings, more of a cinematic bildungsroman than a routine teen-angst saga like last year’s Edge of Seventeen.
Last year’s was The Edge of Seventeen; 2015’s was The Diary of a Teenage Girl.
Both performances are remarkable, brittle and diffident in wholly original ways that distinguish Gerwg’s film from The Edge of Seventeen , Pretty in Pink , and other canonical coming-of-age works that attempt to honestly reckon with issues of privilege.
But in the mode of Diary of a Teenage Girl and The Edge of Seventeen , two other recent coming-of-age stories written and directed by women, Lady Bird finds fresh purchase in well-trodden territory by observing the human carnival from a girl’s point of view.
For that matter, alongside the likes of Easy A, Blockers, The Do-List List, Lady Bird or The Edge of Seventeen (all of which are terrific), Booksmart doesn’t try to position itself as exceptional just because it’s about horny young women instead of horny young men.
Lady Bird and The Edge Of Seventeen announced their directors as filmmakers to watch, while Blockers put the lie to the idea that it’s impossible to be both sensitive to changing social mores and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.
I’m not sure if there’s a constant search for a new favorite high school movie for each generation, but Booksmart could comfortably sit on the same tier as Lady Bird and The Edge of Seventeen .
The high school coming-of-age comedy is a subgenre unto itself, with each decade delivering movies that have become classics, like American Graffiti, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Can't Hardly Wait, Superbad, Easy A and more recent films such as The Edge of Seventeen and Lady Bird.
Recent notable films such as Eighth Grade, Blockers, The Edge of Seventeen to older gems Mean Girls and Clueless have realistically captured the topsy-turvy essence of complicated female growing pains.
In recent years, the coming-of-age genre has been a goldmine of riches, with terrific films like Lady Bird , Eighth Grade , Blockers and The Edge of Seventeen perfectly capturing what it means to be a female teen in the 21st century.
Juno (2007)
Directed by Jason Reitman
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Dialogue Themes Characters
Its verbal style informed by numerous interviews that Fremon Craig conducted with teenagers nationwide, “The Edge of Seventeen” never descends into a “Juno”-esque quirkfest.
Fremon Craig steers clear of the precocious post- Dawson’s Creek , post- Buffy , post- Gilmore Girls , post- Juno dialogue that most teenagers only wish they could speak in; instead, she understands their mastery of passive-aggressive sarcasm and awkward muttering.
Despite plenty of sex talk and Juno -like back chatter, writer-director Kelly Fremon Craig is content to pull off a pleasantly offbeat suburban comedy (shot in Vancouver, passing for the pre-Trump U.S.), in which relatively unidimensional characters have all the perks of upper-middle-class living—swimming pools, cars, violence-free and ethnically monotone parties—without showing signs of struggle or personal ambition.
Some are light like Juno and Easy A whereas others are heavier such as Thirteen and The Perks of Being a Wallflower .
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.
But during these moments, Steinfeld never falls into affectation or unrealistic worldliness that plague inauthentic movie teens throughout time, a la Juno from Juno or Charlie Bartlett from Charlie Bartlett, two films released in the same year.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)
Directed by Stephen Chbosky
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Visuals
Some are light like Juno and Easy A whereas others are heavier such as Thirteen and The Perks of Being a Wallflower .
Director Kelly Fremon Craig’s decision to bring a more John Hughes’ vibe to her film rather than the sun-drenched depression the likes of The Spectacular Now and The Perks of Being a Wallflower brought to the screen was a brave one.
But it can hold its own against “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” “Clueless” and other movies that have raised the bar on teenage movies.
In the best teen films, from “Sixteen Candles” to “Clueless” to “Superbad” to the greatest high school movie of the last ten years, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” the main characters have a way of occupying the moral high ground.
Not since “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” have I seen a drama comedy evoke the themes of John Hughes so beautifully.
10 Things I Hate About You (1999)
Directed by Gil Junger
influenced The Edge of Seventeen (2016)
Themes Characters
Teen comedies like Bring It On (2000) and 10 Things I Hate About You (1999) keep things light but are almost exclusively concerned with rich kids running amok while their parents are off doing something else.
The Edge of Seventeen may not be embraced by John Hughes nostalgists, but Steinfeld's Nadine is a direct descendant of Molly Ringwald's Samantha in Sixteen Candles — as well as of the marginalized heroines played by Winona Ryder in Heathers , Julia Stiles in 10 Things I Hate About You , Thora Birch in Ghost World and many others.