The pain and anguish of turning 16

Sixteen Candles perfectly captures the anxieties, angst and highs and lows of growing up in high school. It’s about the pain of crushes and adolescence, forming relationships, unrequited love and growing into an adult. John Hughes has created a feel good film full of rounded, likeable and believable characters. It doesn’t have the depth, class conflict, youthful anger and sheer bloodied mindedness of The Breakfast Club but it’s still a great film, and maybe an easier one to watch. It’s not all perfect though, there’s the most stereotypical Asian character seen on film since Mr Yunioshi in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and there’s a debatable scene where a high school jock hands his conked out girlfriend to a geek like she was a piece of meat. However, all has to be forgiven simply because this is a John Hughes film and one that’s told with such a feeling and compassion for the young characters.