Sixteen Candles doesn’t
get the respect it deserves. Of all the films in John Hughes’ lauded
’80s teen-flick canon, the epic saga of Samantha Baker (Molly
Ringwald)—who gives her polka-dot undies to a geek and pines away for
senior Jake Ryan (and his red Porsche 944) while her family forgets her
birthday—always gets shrugged off in favor of Hughes’ more serious
films, especially The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink. But Candles
is an incredibly enjoyable farce in its own right, from its crushing
catalog of familial embarrassments and finely drawn high-school social
strata to the cringingly amazing Asian exchange-student stereotype Long
Duk Dong. It’s silly and dirty and goofy—and that’s exactly what makes
it a classic. Academy.
- Best paired with: Double Mountain India Red Ale.
- Also showing: Rope (Laurelhurst).
