John Hughes 5 Best Teen Comedies (& The 5 Best By Other Directors)

John Hughes’ 5 Best Teen Comedies (& The 5 Best By Other Directors)

John Hughes is the most famous director of high school comedies, but he’s not the only filmmaker to try their hand at the teen comedy subgenre.

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John Hughes is one of the most celebrated filmmakers of all time, and one of the only celebrated filmmakers to have made their name in teen comedies. From National Lampoon’s Vacation to Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, he made plenty of classics outside the teen subgenre, but high school will always be the subject matter that Hughes is most associated with.

While Hughes is responsible for a lot of the most revered high school movies, plenty of other directors have tried their hand at it and produced classics that fans of the genre should definitely check out also.

10 Hughes: Sixteen Candles (1984)

Some directors need a couple of movies to figure out what makes their cinematic voice unique, but John Hughes instantly established himself as one of the greatest directors of teen comedies with his 1984 debut feature Sixteen Candles.

Molly Ringwald, who would go on to become Hughes’ go-to leading lady, stars as Sam Baker, whose 16th birthday celebrations are plagued by every setback and obstacle imaginable, making it a lastingly relatable story.

9 Other Director: Superbad (Greg Mottola, 2007)

Written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg when they were actually in high school, Superbad is a painfully relatable snapshot of life as a teenager. Jonah Hill and Michael Cera share impeccable on-screen chemistry as a pair of best friends desperately trying to secure booze for a big party.

Raunchy high school comedies about teenagers trying to lose their virginity are ten a penny, but few of them resonate as much as Superbad. Throughout the movie, it becomes less about getting laid for the main characters and more about separation anxiety.

8 Hughes: Weird Science (1985)

The high-concept premise of Weird Science hasn’t aged particularly well, since it tells the story of two geeks who use a computer program to create the perfect woman, but it’s somewhat redeemed by Kelly LeBrock’s hilarious performance as their creation, Lisa.

While Weird Science may not stack up next to Hughes’ other high school classics, it offers a delightfully absurdist riff on the Frankenstein story with some great supporting players like Bill Paxton or a young Robert Downey Jr.

7 Other Director: Risky Business (Paul Brickman, 1983)

In addition to being the movie that made Tom Cruise a star, Risky Business was also the first feature helmed by writer-director Paul Brickman. The movie is remembered for Cruise dancing to Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll” in his underwear, but it’s a great comedy overall.

Cruise plays Joel Goodson, who just wants to have a little fun while his parents are away and ends up getting in trouble with a ruthless pimp and sinking his mom and dad’s Porsche in Lake Michigan.

6 Hughes: Pretty In Pink (1986)

Technically, Hughes only wrote and executive-produced Pretty in Pink, while Howard Deutch directed it, but it has all the hallmarks of a Hughes classic. Molly Ringwald stars as a high schooler torn between her childhood best friend and a rich kid.

Ringwald elevates the movie’s somewhat formulaic script with a charming, lovable lead performance, while Two and a Half Men’s Jon Cryer gives an unforgettable supporting turn as Duckie.

5 Other Director: Clueless (Amy Heckerling, 1995)

Amy Heckerling’s Clueless masterfully recontextualizes the plot of the 1815 Jane Austen novel Emma to take place in Beverly Hills in the ‘90s. Alicia Silverstone stars in her most iconic role as Cher Horowitz, a popular girl who decides to give a new student at her school a makeover.

In the hands of any other filmmaker, Clueless could’ve been a monument to excess, but Heckerling was more interested in satirizing the high school “in” crowd and the glitterati of Beverly Hills.

4 Hughes: The Breakfast Club (1985)

Hughes used The Breakfast Club as a vehicle to deconstruct all the genre tropes he helped to create. It tells the story of a jock, a nerd, a popular girl, an outcast, and a goth all stuck in Saturday detention together. Throughout the day, they realize they’re not so different after all.

The casting is spot-on, the character-driven storytelling is compelling, and the final shot of John walking through the football field is one of the most recognizable images in film history and one of the all-time best teen movie endings.

3 Other Director: Dazed And Confused (Richard Linklater, 1993)

Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused doesn’t follow much of a plot. Instead, its characters spend the last day of school driving around town, drinking beer and smoking pot. It’s the ultimate hangout movie, seamlessly flowing from scene to scene with a refreshingly laidback attitude.

With a string of hilariously relatable vignettes and a soundtrack containing rock ‘n’ roll hits by such legendary artists as Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Deep Purple, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, Dazed and Confused perfectly captures the free, youthful, vibrant feeling of finishing high school.

2 Hughes: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)

Easily the most iconic high school movie in the John Hughes oeuvre is Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Matthew Broderick stars as a popular senior who cons his way into a day off school with a fake illness and then spends the afternoon in Chicago with his friends.

Hughes uses this simplistic but effective premise to dig into some surprisingly thought-provoking ideas, like Ferris’ “Life moves pretty fast…” monologue.

1 Other Director: Lady Bird (Greta Gerwig, 2017)

Across its year-long story timeline, Greta Gerwig’s solo directorial debut Lady Bird covers all aspects of its title character’s life – her family life, her friendships at school, her first couple of loves – but the emotional backbone of the movie is her troubled love-hate relationship with her mom.

Saoirse Ronan fully embodies the role of a rebellious teenager from Sacramento, perfectly matched opposite co-stars Laurie Metcalf, Tracy Letts, Beanie Feldstein, and Timothée Chalamet.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/best-teen-comedies-john-hughes-modern-similar/

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