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| By Don Roff |
“Saturday, March 24, 1984,” brain Brian Johnson (played by Anthony Michael Hall) writes. “Shermer High School, Shermer, Illinois. 60062. Dear Mr. Vernon, we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was that we did wrong. What we did WAS wrong. But we think you’re crazy to make us write this essay telling you who we think we are. What do you care? You see us as you want to see us. In the simplest terms, and the most convenient definitions: you see us as a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, and a criminal. Correct? That’s the way we saw each other at seven o’clock this morning. We were brainwashed.”
And so begins The Breakfast Club, a coming together of unlikely individuals who discover that despite their differences, they have much alliance and friendship together against a common foe, Principal John Vernon (Paul Gleeson). For those of us who were of the age of the characters when John Hughes’ immortal film was released, if we talk about the film, we must talk about ourselves.
Somehow in those 97 minutes, we were transformed, intrinsically linked to the characters. We learned that we ourselves are a sum of the parts—the brain, athlete, basket case, princess, and criminal who dwell within us all just like they did in that library.
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