Before I commence with reviews proper, for the last time:
Pretty in Pink and
Some Kind of Wonderful are not John Hughes films. They are successive Howard Deutch films written and produced by John Hughes, and if you can't tell that from watching a random sampling of either, well, you aren't and never were a connoisseur of John Hughes.
As a director, Hughes suggests a frustrated drummer--he hired great editors like Paul Hirsch (for Ferris Bueller's Day Off) and Lou Lombardo (for Uncle Buck--the same man cut The Wild Bunch!) to carry out his backbeat and rim-shots. Consider the art gallery montage in Ferris Bueller's Day Off or the bit in Uncle Buck where Macaulay Culkin looks through the mail slot at Amy Madigan and thinks he's seeing three bearded psychos, then ask yourself if there are analogous moments in Pretty in Pink, Some Kind of Wonderful, or any other John Hughes production-only.
What's worse is that Pretty in Pink is often called the quintessential John Hughes movie when in fact it's the quintessential Molly Ringwald movie, an inversion of Sixteen Candles (her first film with Hughes at the helm) in that every one of its characters is somehow obsessed with her. (Pretty in Pink transformed a teen idol into a carrot-topped icon.) In The Breakfast Club, you have Hughes' preoccupation with class manifesting itself in the cliquish roles that high school kids adopt, which as he knows are really in place to separate the upper and lower economic tiers of students. When he's the screenwriter with no intention of directing, Hughes' social-structure subtext bubbles to the surface, as though he's deathly afraid of the substitute Hughes missing it--Pretty in Pink almost belongs to the "snobs vs. slobs" sub-genre, with Ringwald's Cinderella fashionista Andie transparently pitted against a coke-sniffing rich boy (a cretinous James Spader, one of the picture's strongest elements) for the soul of an upper-middle-class smooth-talker (Andrew McCarthy).
The capital "C" on Class gets a little smaller--but not much, I grant--with
Some Kind of Wonderful, a sensitive examination of a love triangle between grease-monkey artist Keith (Eric Stoltz), his best friend Watts (Mary Stuart Masterson), a tomboy who seems to come from an abusive home, and the pampered yet less-than-privileged Amanda Jones (Lea Thompson). What we discover about these people is far more complex than anything
Pretty in Pink imparts, and I have a feeling it was scripted in response to its cowardly predecessor--you wonder what you've learned from
Pretty in Pink once Andie's self-absorption reaches critical mass, while Keith is on a quest to give up what little he has to whomever needs it the most, a lovely sentiment if there ever was one.
My dear friends Kat and Jaelyn are going to castrate me for writing this, but in addition to unimaginative direction, banal scenes concerning Andie's pecuniary shame (such as the one in which she drives through a wealthy neighbourhood wishing aloud that she lived in one of its big houses; meantime, thanks to movie logic, her own digs are positively palatial), and the abrupt, chickenshit conclusion, Pretty in Pink has Duckie (Jon Cryer) to try our patience. Hollywood never did find a use for Cryer's funhouse-Matthew Broderick face and huckster voice, and after seeing him in Pretty in Pink as the geek outcast Anthony Michael Hall might've played (with better results, no doubt) a year or two prior, you wonder why they kept trying. Obnoxious would be too kind to describe Cryer's portrayal of Duckie; so would repugnant, repellent, and invidious. (Hand me a thesaurus, this could take all day.) It's supposed to be cute that Andie strings her secret admirer Duckie along, but not just Duckie's actions--such as his setting off a burglar alarm at the quaint record store where Andie works to get her attention, or leaving messages on her answering machine every 60 seconds--give pause: Cryer exposes something rancorous within himself that frightens us innocent moviegoers. I wouldn't want to be there when Duckie finally detonates.
Duckie's flipside, Watts, is that perfect eighties marriage of leather, denim, and a Madonna haircut. Masterson, it must be said, owns Some Kind of Wonderful--the twinkle in her eye turns a dry insult at the picture's close into a poignant riposte: explaining to Watts that he never realized how amazing she is, Keith provokes her deadpan reply, "That's 'cause you're stupid." The movie is gracefully performed by each of its players, however, features the best soundtrack of any film with which Hughes is affiliated (I mean, wow, The Jesus and Mary Chain!), and has enormous repeat value, a fact I attribute to it being a tad unassuming. I adore Some Kind of Wonderful, but Pretty in Pink is for pure nostalgists.
Pretty in Pink bests Some Kind of Wonderful on DVD. Both films are presented at 1.85:1 in anamorphic widescreen; the latter has a murky quality due in part to cinematographer Jan Kiesser's soft-lens style. (Tak Fujimoto shot Pretty in Pink during an especially bright phase in his career.) Pretty in Pink's music has more sonic depth, though it must be said that a Dolby Digital 5.1 remix doesn't do much for the four-track elements of either film besides provide their pop scores a potentially louder soundstage. Neither DVD is an official disappointment--especially compared to the washed-out, monoriffic VHS alternatives--except in the supplemental department, as the discs do not include a single bonus item between them. Why Paramount is suddenly averse to trailers shall remain a mystery for today.-Bill Chambers
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