Admittedly, this blog entry is a bit later than usual. I first saw this film a couple of weeks ago, which makes my view of The Breakfast Club either two weeks overdue or ten years overdue. Then again, I’m not really sure I’d have appreciated this film as much in my high school years, but I suppose that’s life.

To my recollection, this is the first film since I started blogging that I needed to see twice before I felt comfortable in putting my thoughts to keyboard. Mostly, this is because of how the film is structured. Our characters are in detention through the entirety of this 98-minute movie, yet it takes a full hour of screen time until they can open up to each other. I could sympathize with these characters as I watched them bicker amongst each other, but I couldn’t quite figure out what the point of it was. Call me dense, but I couldn’t divine exactly what message this movie was trying to convey.

Bender was a huge part of the problem. I got Andrew, who knew why he was there and wanted nothing but to get through detention with his reputation intact. I got Brian, who just wanted to keep on being the model student. I got Claire, who saw this whole thing as a nightmare she wanted to wake from as quickly as possible. Allison appeared to be a detached comic relief that no one really paid attention to. But Bender, I just couldn’t get. Was he trying to stir shit up for attention? For the hell of it? Out of hatred for everyone else? Was he jealous of the others and too proud to admit it? Was it any or all or none of the above? Naturally, Bender gets most of the screen time and dialogue through the movie’s first hour, so I spent most of my brainpower in that first run trying to figure out just what Bender’s game was.

Then came the third act. That’s when Allison finally starts to open up. As do Claire and Andrew and Brian and even Mr. Vernon. And that’s when the light in my head went on. I started seeing the film and these characters through a whole different lens, changing my viewing experience so radically that I had to see the film a second time knowing what I knew then.

This film is all about the relationship between these kids and their parents. Andrew, Brian and Claire all work solely to live up to their parents’ expectations, getting the grades and keeping the friends that they’ll need toward that purpose. And all the while, they don’t even realize or acknowledge how much they hate their parents for it. Yet — as Mr. Vernon so astutely points out to the janitor — the adults will only be in charge for a little while longer. In just a few years, these students will graduate and hopefully be their own masters. But that can’t happen until they realize that adults are fallible and — in many cases — full of shit, as they come to help each other learn through the movie.

Bender’s deal is that his unhealthy home life taught him from an early age that adults in charge are full of shit. This might not necessarily be such a bad attitude if Bender didn’t apply it universally, taking it to an extremely unhealthy extent. Because his adult authority figures are incompetent, all adult authority figures must be incompetent. Ergo, any standards they set are bullshit and must be defied at any cost. He acts on this outlook in a way that’s destructive, mean-spirited, uncaring and short-sighted, which really doesn’t help his case or make him look good.

If nothing else, this movie is a master class in how to develop characters. I’m sure it helps that there are only six or seven characters in this movie and they’re all cast perfectly, but this is still a screenplay that’s unparalleled in characterization. There is not a single wasted opportunity to develop these characters. We learn about them from every line of dialogue and every action. We learn about them from how they arrive at school. We learn about them from how they eat lunch. Where they sit when they arrive at detention speaks volumes about them. Hell, when a film’s characters are plainly identifiable from nothing but a shot of their feet, that film has done a damn good job at developing its characters. Absolutely phenomenal.

The characters’ arcs are to be admired as well. Yes, the lion’s share of it is crammed into those climactic tear-filled confessions in the third act, but those could never have taken place if the events of the first hour didn’t get them to that point. The intimate camera work, the heartfelt acting, the conservative score and the rock-solid script all work seamlessly together to make these characters grow and bring them to vivid life. I really do feel like I’ve met these young people, and I can pay no higher compliment to a film like this.

I know that The Breakfast Club wasn’t the first high school coming-of-age tale and it sure as hell wasn’t the last, but I’ll be very pleased and amazed if I ever see such a film as solidly crafted and heartfelt as this one. To all those who’ve made the similar mistake of putting off this film, I’d urge you not to put it off any longer.