SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL - Hughes' musings on teen life confusing.
U.S. Release Date: FEBRUARY 27, 1987
By 1987, teen movie maestro John Hughes had maybe said all he wanted to say about the life of the American teen with his 1984 breakthrough Sixteen Candles, the classic 1985 drama The Breakfast Club and the one-two box office punch of ‘86 - the romance Pretty in Pink and the comedy Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Come the Best Movie Year Ever, the hair product was plentiful but the narrative inspiration, not so much…
Hughes had turned redhead Molly Ringwald into a box-office force; at the height of her fame, she was afforded a TIME magazine cover. The writer/director perhaps thought he was onto winning streak (no pun intended) when he cast ‘ranga Eric Stoltz as Keith (Keith?) in his sort-of earnest, sort-of sexy romance Some Kind of Wonderful, a gender-swap reworking of his own Pretty in Pink.
The production has been the subject of much retrospection over the years, from this 2006 ‘making of…’ video special to a 2019 oral history from Entertainment Weekly, each providing insight into the many iterations Hughes’ script went through before the cast and crew were ready to shoot. It ultimately hits (a career-defining Mary Stuart Masterson performance) and misses (what is Keith’s point, anyway?) in equal measure, but it offers much to discuss and listen to your new favourite podcast.
The Podcast
With their shirts buttoned right to the top, sexy drummer Dan Barrett and grease monkey hottie Simon Foster try to make some kind of sense out of Some Kind of Wonderful in this week’s BEST MOVIE YEAR podcast:
Simon and Dan have undertaken to watch 100 movies from January through December of 1987 to answer mankind’s most pressing question: Was it the best movie year ever?
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The video version of our show is available on both Spotify and YouTube.
Email us: podcast@bestmovieyear.com
Start your journey back to the heady days of that wonderful film year with past podcasts…
Episode 1: WITHNAIL & I; Episode 2: THE KINDRED; Episode 3: THE STEPFATHER
Episode 4: OUTRAGEOUS FORTUNE; Episode 5: RADIO DAYS;
Episode 6: LIGHT OF DAY; Episode 7: MANNEQUIN; Episode 8: OVER THE TOP;
Episode 9: A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 3: DREAM WARRIORS;
Episode 10: LETHAL WEAPON
Coming Soon, on BEST MOVIE YEAR: 1987
