Sixteen Candles (1984)

Classic is both racist and sexist.
I think I first watched this movie when I was 13. I found it all right then, though the main plot line of the popular boy falling for the gawky younger girl fell a little flat even then. Upon watching it again at the age of 20, I found several aspects of it to be offensive. First there is the pretty horrific Asian stereotype which really isn't even funny. It mostly reminded me of the way Michael Scott from The Office might behave if he were trying to imitate someone who was Asian. Then there is a scene which is slightly less obvious and is therefore even more dangerous: in it, the popular boy who the gawky girl is lusting over hands over his very drunk popular girlfriend to the geeky guy and basically says, "Yeah man, have a good time". This is dangerous because it mirrors a lot of real life situations. I mean, did they seriously not realize this was rape in the '80s?

I suppose if the story was well written overall it could be salvaged in spite of these huge missteps, but like I said before, there isn't nearly enough development of the Sam/Jake story for me to really invest anything in it or find it believable. This goes 10 times for the extremely odd pairing of the popular girl and the geek. The dialog between them the morning after and her break up with Jake was the sappiest, least believable tripe in the entire movie. I'm going to basically discount all of the stereotypical high school stuff because this is probably among the movies that started all that anyway. At its core it's a mediocre teenage movie with a cast that lack diversity and a script that lacks class.

Great Movie well worth watching
We recieved this movie quickly and undamaged. My daugter 12yrs old just asked for it out of the blue and loved it.

Great Movie well worth watching
We recieved this movie quickly and undamaged. My daugter 12yrs old just asked for it out of the blue and loved it.