St. Elmo's Fire: Classic or BETTER THAN CLASSIC?

Well, that and I have a Breakfast Club bias.

I'm watching the Breakfast Club right now! I do not own St. Elmo's Fire :(

I first saw this movie when I was in my early 20s or very late teens (it's one of those things where I remember the relationship I was in at the time -- so sometime between 17-21), so it was like the Lost Brat Pack movie for me.

http://www.judd-website.co.uk/images/alec3.jpg

http://bitchcakes.topcities.com/images/stemosfire.jpg

Ally, it appears we've done this once or twice before :)

the empathising with AM in SEF is endemic i think, and possibly partially responsible for me thinking smoking was way cool, as he smokes almost constantly during the film, if i recall the only scene he doesn't have a fag at any point is when he's shagging...

"St.Elmo's Fire"? K-rap!

I have not read all this thread.

oh man, watching this on hulu for the first time since i saw it in the theater. so many crimes i forgot... the billy idol neon mural! andrew mccarthy & the hooker!

Yeah, Judd was hot, but Rob Lowe was the hottness. How do you stay hot for DECADES?

dude has barely aged at all

lowe that is

some kind of wonderful should be sat with the grown-ups

"St.Elmo's Fire" should have been good, but it ended up being a directionless, self-indulgent dollop of spooge. It's not even in the same zip code as "Breakfast Club". Let's say that "Breakfast Club," "Sixteen Candles" and "Weird Science" were hosting a Thanksgiving, "St.Elmo's Fire" wouldn't even be welcome at the kids' table in the kitchen (where, y'know, "Some Kind of Wonderful" and "Out of Bounds" would be sitting (although "Out of Bounds" would be allowed to enter the main dining room to have coffee with the adults afterwards, if only for its inspired inclusion of Siouxsie & the Banshees as "club band".

"St.Elmo's Fire"? K-rap!

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, August 30, 2004 7:57 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark

boy, this movie sucked. (and i only just NOW watched it ... the missing 80s brat pack/joel schumacher film. feh.)

I've seen just about every well-loved "generation" movie from the 80s except for this one, and I'm still in no rush.

which means that the only joel schumacher film i can sign off on is falling down ... and i don't know if i want to watch that one again, to see if it's still as good as i remember it being (watching the lost boys a year or so ago, for the first time since like high school, dispelled me of any fond teenage memories of THAT film it sure did).

FWIW, it had the honor of being one of the few films i just turned off about 15 minutes into it (an honor shared with napoleon dynamite, BTW).

Awful, awful movie. Characters who you don't care if they live or die. Especially Emilio Estevez the stalker and Rob Lowe the lame sax player would be bad boy.

OMG people this movie is amazing. Is it awful? Sure but it's wonderful in it's awfulness. For Christ's sake Demi utters the following lines in it, ""I'm with these Arabs and they've been forcing me to do coke all night. I'm not sure because I don't understand much Arabic but I think I heard the word gangbang. You've gotta come and get me! Genius.

Roadhouse is wonderful in its awfulness. St. Elmo's Fire is just awful. This is only my opinion. Everyone has their own version of awful. St. Elmo's Fire is one of mine, because it doesn't succeed on its own terms. It's clear that it's the director and writers intent that you have something invested in these characters, but they're just awful, boorish people, every last one of them.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Gdt6SgFdNNw/TCkUfu345FI/AAAAAAAASBs/ToCWm4cryn0/s400/andwasteallthisgoodcoke.jpg

It's clear that it's the director and writers intent that you have something invested in these characters, but they're just awful, boorish people, every last one of them.

^^ this. and i hate to beat the point to death, but Joel Schumacher is just awful awful awful in every way -- this and the lost boys just haven't held up the way that John Hughes's films have.

Roadhouse is wonderful in its awfulness.

roadhouse had ben gazzara, st. elmo's fire didn't and john paar ain't a patch on jeff healey. these distinctions make all the difference.

I'm not saying it's a GOOD movie by any means but that I still think it's awesome. Granted, I haven't watched it in at least 10 years but I watched it . . . a lot prior to that.

Don't diss John Paar man. That song fucking rules.

the Brat Pack are just bros and bro-hos, only in dayglo and with shittier background music and no joy.

http://www.vh1.com/video/john-parr/58624/naughty-naughty.jhtml#artist=13893

Andrew McCarthy's crowning achievement? I say Weekend at Bernie's.

i'm a mannequin man myself -- that one even got a shout-out by Ween!

x-post

I refuse to listen to that. Paar struck gold with "Man in Motion" and that's how I want to remember him.

Mannequin is awesome but also in a so bad it's good sorta way and mostly because of Hollywood.

These jelly donuts are calling my name. Can you hear them? Hollywood? Hollywood!

I refuse to listen to that.

not even to see a young lisa rinna?!?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8xUqT4I0H0&feature=related

omg Hotel New Hampshire. Has there ever been a thread about that? You know, the movie where he fucks his sister Jodie Foster?

Haven't seen Mannequin since the 80s and it was only just a few years ago that I realized Kim Cattral was the mannequin.

Yep

You know what else is great about Mannequin? Starship, that's what.

NOTHIN'S GONNA STOP US NOW

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0w5s6V8rQH4

let them say we're crazy
WHAT DO THEY KNOW?????????????????????

Exactly.

TS: "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us" vs "Sara"

That was the last straw for Grace Slick, wasn't it? She bolted almost immediately after this song iirc.

to think, i used to take my sartorial cues from andrew mccarthy ... o_O

OMG NO LIE DAN

I was just about to post - "Where's Dan Perry - he'd agree with me on this tip" because I remember some exchange on facebook like 2 years ago where we both professed some Starship <3.

only in "sara" do they sing about "happy endings" ... so that one.

but the dream didn't come true ... ;_;

"Find Your Way Back" is my jam.

In 1987, "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" was featured in the film Mannequin and hit #1, although only Slick and Thomas (plus Craig Chaquiço's guitar solo) appeared on it. At that time, the song made Slick the oldest female vocalist to sing on a number-one Billboard Hot 100 hit, at the age of 47, (She held this record until Cher broke it at the age of 52, in 1999 with "Believe".) The following year, the band's song "Wild Again" (which reached #73 on the Billboard singles chart) was used in the movie Cocktail.

By the time No Protection was released, bassist and keyboardist Pete Sears had left the band. Sears went on to play keyboards with former Jefferson Airplane members, Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady in Hot Tuna for ten years. Starship's No Protection was not released until well after "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" (its most popular single) had peaked on the charts, and went gold; in addition to "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" (#1), it featured the singles "It's Not Over ('Til It's Over)" (#9), and "Beat Patrol" (#46). The last song on the album, "Set The Night To Music", would later become a huge hit when re-recorded as a duet between Roberta Flack and Maxi Priest. For the No Protection tour, Brett Bloomfield was brought in to replace Sears and Mark Morgan was their new stage keyboardist.

Grace Slick left Starship in 1988, going on to join the reformed Jefferson Airplane, for one album in 1989, before announcing that she was retiring from music. As Kantner, Sears and Freiberg had left the band, all the new and remaining members were more than a decade younger than she was. To this day Slick maintains that old(er) people "don't belong on a rock and roll stage".[8]

I STILL LOVE YOU ANDREW MCCARTHY!!!

but the dream didn't come true ... ;_;

well that's what happens when you're fire and ice

also, didn't one of the Starshippers kick Mickey Thomas in the face and end up in jail/kicked outta the band?!?

My friend Adam and I used to sometimes call each other and as soon as one person picked up the caller would start singing "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us" before even saying hello. It was our thing. I called him last year and sang it into his voicemail.

I called him last year and sang it into his voicemail.

cuet

from wikipedia:

With Slick's departure, Thomas became sole lead singer. The revamped lineup released Love Among the Cannibals in August 1989. On September 24 of that year while the band was in Scranton, Pennsylvania for a show, Donny Baldwin seriously injured Mickey Thomas in a fight.[9] Thomas was forced to undergo reconstructive facial surgery and Baldwin was fired.

no mention about being kicked in the face, though

haven't seen Mannequin, only Mannequin 2, but I love it.

have seen Hotel New Hampshire, which is a giant mess. didn't like it at the time, but I kinda want to see it again

St. Elmo's Fire is crap, but Breakfast Club has to stand on a chair to kiss its foot

only Schumacher film I ever really gave a damn about seeing was Flatliners, which I still have yet to see

also Grace Slick rules

ultimate STARSHIP showdown

Flatliners seemed awesome to me in 1990 (that's when it came out, right?), but I can believe with every ounce of my being that I'd find it awful now.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Flatliners seemed awesome to me in 1990 (that's when it came out, right?), but I can believe with every ounce of my being that I'd find it awful now.

that would fit the joel schumacher pattern, it would seem. i'm tempted to rent falling down to see if THAT one has held up (or not).

Just took a peep at Schumacher's filmography. Didn't realize he'd done A Time to Kill (which is awesome still) and The Number 23 (which is one of the worst films of the last ten years).

A Time to Kill is really good.

What's #23? Is that w/ John Cusack?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Number_23

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cc/Number23.jpg

SO DREADFUL

Oh yeah I think that's what I was thinking of but got it confused with something that had Cusack in it with a number in the title.

I think you're thinking of Identity?

hmmmm

what was the one with a hotel room where something weird happened in a room?

Room 1408 or something, I think.

Michael Douglas:The Angriest White Man?

an interesting discussion of falling down in the above thread

oh right,I forgot Room 1408 existed

Identity was the one where all of these people check into a motel and someone starts killing them one by one and then something really ludicrous is revealed that is really fun if you don't think too hard about it

Never saw either of those, but I'd be more inclined to watch Identity.

Andrew McCarthy's crowning achievement? I say Weekend at Bernie's.

― Johnny Fever, Wednesday, 23 March 2011 18:11 (34 minutes ago)

I vote for a little-known gem called "Heaven Help Us." Takes place at a Jesuit school in mid-'60s Brooklyn. It can't decide whether or not it's a raunch teen comedy or a serious drama, but it's got some really great scenes, and McCarthy is very good as a meloncholic teenager whose parents have died, forcing him and his little sister to live with his extremely religious grandparents. Also, fantastic, hilarious supporting performance from Kevin Dillon and a masterfully understated Donald Sutherland turn as Brother Thaddeus, the head Jesuit.

Oooh am gonna watch that! (Identity, I mean)

I sort of love Falling Down. Is that Schumacher too?

Heaven Help Us is great.

If you embrace the fact that it's really, really ludicrous, Identity is fun IMO

although a lot of ppl find it boring because they watch a lot more jump-horror/psycho stalker stuff than I do

My McCarthy movie I suspect will always be Less Than Zero

(btw I did see the beginning of Flatliners but my mom made me leave after half an hour or so...I would;'ve had to have been no older than 12)

My McCarthy movie I suspect will always be Less Than Zero

That was really Robert Downey Jr.'s movie, though, imo.

I love St Elmo's Fire forever and always, when I was little it was like the 'oooh naughty grown up' version of Breakfast Club, where there's drugs and boobs and all kinds of O_O.

All I will say is this:

Rob Lowe
tank top with bats
Saxophone

unfuckwithable. I don't care how the movie has aged, I don't care if it doesn't hold up to 'filmgoing' standards...unfuckwithable.

The worst is Mare Winningham's monologue about making a peanut butter sandwich in her first OWN apartment, and how it was the "best peanut butter sandwich I hever had."

Or the "stalking is sooo cute" Emilio Estevez.

Or the little profound things Rob Lowe says to his friends as he boards the bust to NY at the end: "Don't let her go..." in a stage whisper. Blah!

Yeah, I've seen it many times, had HBO when I was a kid.

Heaven Help Us also features a young Yeardley Smith. IIRC she gets drunk and throws up in a car. We spent a lot of time in high school looking for a place that was like the bar Mary Stuart Masterson takes Andrew McCarthy to in Heaven Help Us. It seemed like it would be paradise.

I STILL LOVE YOU ANDREW MCCARTHY!!!

― ENBB, Wednesday, March 23, 2011 2:30 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

had to double-check to make sure this wasn't posted by me

oh I'm so glad you're here :)

Yeah, I've seen it many times, had HBO when I was a kid.

― thirdalternative, Wednesday, March 23, 2011 3:32 PM (49 minutes ago) Bookmark

I was going to say - for someone who hates it so much you sure seem to remember a lot about this movie.

I sort of love Falling Down. Is that Schumacher too?

yup, it is.

Heaven Help Us also features a young Yeardley Smith. IIRC she gets drunk and throws up in a car. We spent a lot of time in high school looking for a place that was like the bar Mary Stuart Masterson takes Andrew McCarthy to in Heaven Help Us. It seemed like it would be paradise.

― the girl from spirea x (f. hazel), Wednesday, March 23, 2011 4:08 PM (34 minutes ago) Bookmark

Wasn't that an off-season place on Coney Island? Great use of Otis Redding's "I've Been Loving You Too Long" in that scene. Or do you mean the soda fountain where her character worked?

I was going to say - for someone who hates it so much you sure seem to remember a lot about this movie.

― ENBB, Wednesday, March 23, 2011 4:22 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark

I'd watch it whenever it was on as a sort of masochistic exercise.

u love it really

Oh, Heaven Help Us also features Audrey from Vacation (a bit more grown up), and Wallace Shawn in this incredible scene (and John Heard!) And the kid from Fright Night . . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BE-5Ye15PVY

Sorry for hijacking St. Elmo with Heaven Help Us.

Wait which Audrey - Original Vacation Audrey?

man this is on cable all the time. Is there an anigif of shirtless Rob Lowe playing saxophone? non-stop hilarity

omg I hope so

Yeah, original Vacation Audren. She's in the vid I just posted, sitting next to young Yardley Smith (Lisa Simpson).

OG Audrey! The only good one. I hated how they turned her into a fat winer in European Vacation.

http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lat22ft7q21qalcu6o1_500.gif

Audrey from Euro Vacay died of something tragic really young but I can't remember the deats. Ok, yeah - I see her now.

http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lfi4jz8Gzq1qcuhr9o1_500.gif

http://www.moviemarket.com/library/photos/265/265029.jpg

you know how I know he's ROCK N ROLL in this pic? cuz he is wearing a sleeveless shirt with BATS on it

seriously ever scene in this is a laff riot of wrongness

lol I see Vegemite Grrrl has already noted this awesomeness

omg the bats

someone needs to get ZS to animate that

http://cdn.pimpmyspace.org/media/pms/c/l3/3s/se/elmos2.jpg

really goin all in here

dub this over his sax scene

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-seDrv1eQo

Audrey from Euro Vacay died of something tragic really young but I can't remember the deats. Ok, yeah - I see her now.

― ENBB, Wednesday, 23 March 2011 20:56 (35 minutes ago)

I just looked it up. She had severe diabetes all her life, and died following a paralytic stroke at age 32. And it turns out she was quite accomplished on stage and screen. Now I feel like a dick. I'm sorry I called her fat.

Poor Audrey.

"Pan-o...Am-o?"

Rob Lowe was ridiculously handsome (still is, but JEESSUS those old clips)

also

BATS

my only footnote to St Elmos Fire was the last time I watched it I was kind of bummed that I had grown up and suddenly followed all of the eyerolling angst about 'omg what do I do with my life' zzz boredom...was so much better when I was a kid and it was like Saxophones! Drinking! Demi Moore is taking drugs!

it's creepy how goodlooking rob lowe is in this movie. i remember thinking that as a kid. it's somehow not right.

hahah doesn't demi moore say "i didn't think i'd be so tired at 22!" at some point ahahahahahahaha

thought demi moore's voice was the coolest thing ever

I like how Mare Winningham goes through the entire film dressed like a dowdy 18th century matron just to underscore the fact that SHE R A VIRGIN

also lol that Rob Lowe can't resist deflowering her

that scene where Rob Lowe is undressing her and she was wearing all that crazy woollen underwear and he starts laughing and she gets all mad

also horshoe otm about how creeepily handsome Lowe is in St Elmo.
I was a pre-teen and he was giving me funny feelings even THEN :D

is it ever explained why they are even all friends with each other? this was another one of those awesome character oversights (like with Sex and the City) where it's never explained why any of these people would be spending any time together in the first place.

I sort of assumed high school?

i thought they all went to georgetown together

yeah maybe it was college...didn't it start off with them all graduating or there's a freeze frame or something with graduation hats?

St. Elmo's Fire is a 1985 American coming-of-age film directed by Joel Schumacher. The film, starring Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Andrew McCarthy, Demi Moore, Judd Nelson, Ally Sheedy, and Mare Winningham, is a prominent movie of the Brat Pack genre, and revolves around a group of friends that have just graduated from Georgetown University and their adjustment to their post-university lives and the responsibilities of encroaching adulthood.

well whatever I went to school with a whole lot of people I was never friends with (colleges are full of cliques!). I guess that's a better explanation than no explanation though. (The Sex and the City thing has always bothered me)

xp

also has anybody else mentioned that the theme song plays EVERY 5 MINUTES in this movie

haha i know!

omg i'm going to end up watching this tonight aren't i?

editor was like "gee how do we end this scene ....hmmm *drums fingers on forehead*... I've got it! We'll just cut in the themesong!"

I am perplexed that anyone would spend any time losing sleep over the backstory behind the SATC girls not being fully explored

It is one of the greatest theme songs of our time

I love it, and I don't even UNDERSTAND what the hell the actual St Elmo's Fire has to do with A) that song and b) that movie

I like when Rob Lowe goes back to visit his fraternity... like any fraternity remembers guys who graduated years ago. "I heard stories about your awesome saxophone playing!"

I am perplexed that anyone would spend any time losing sleep over the backstory behind the SATC girls not being fully explored

I often obsess over premises of things (see the Cars movie thread)

like the wistful freeze frame on the facade of st elmo's as the gang goes home to rest up for brunch.

hahah doesn't demi moore say "i didn't think i'd be so tired at 22!" at some point ahahahahahahaha

― horseshoe, Wednesday, March 23, 2011 5:42 PM (42 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

thought demi moore's voice was the coolest thing ever

― horseshoe, Wednesday, March 23, 2011 5:43 PM (41 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

HS OTM as per usual

If someone could animate the RL sax scene and dub the Moldova tune over it I think I could die happy. I just revisited Moldova sax man vid the other day and, yep, still awesome.

Judd Nelson's character is such as asshole in this movie. Feel like he's a little too good at playing assholes.

a more handsome asshole there has never been imo

he was 100% of the reason why I watched Suddenly Susan...and yes, I'm kind of ashamed to admit that now

he is ridiculously horrible. sometimes his whole getting married will force me to be faithful logic in that movie will pop into my head and i'll get all furious. at a made up character in a terrible movie.

xp

isn't he also turning into a republican over the course of the movie? worst

YES! Everything about him is repulsive.

I love when Judd and whatsername fight over who gets what records

or is that Andy McCarthy? shit it's all blurring together

You know what's a great detail? The fact that Ali Sheedy is wearing her pearls while she and McCarthy do it in the shower.

no that was nelson and sheedy. at the end of that scene, nelson yells, "WASTED love! i just wish i could get it back." omg everything about this movie is funny if you don't have to be watching it.

xp

I think that was Judd and Ali, yeah.

lollllll

yes that sex + pearls in the shower scene made quite an impression on me

haha, right?

I can't lie - I kind of wanted Jules' awful pink apartment with the ridic Billy Idol mural.

so many lols

Alec: You cannot have the Pretenders' first album! That's mine.
Leslie: I bought it.
Alec: You did not! You can have all the Billy Joels... except The Stranger.
Leslie: I'm taking Thriller and Mahler's ninth.
Alec: Kevin is so fond of Mahler.
Leslie: I moved in with Jules.
Alec: Oh how nice, roomies again... No Springsteen is leaving this house! You can have all the Carly Simons.
Leslie: You got me those for Valentine's Day. Remember, they're used to be Valentine's Day here, Remember?
Alec: You ran out on this relationship. You take the consequences.
Leslie: I didn't run out on anything. You ran out.
Alec: You fucked Kevin.
Leslie: You fucked many!
Alec: Nameless, faceless many!
Leslie: I feel much better now, thanks.
Alec: You're not taking The Police.
Leslie: Anyway, I didn't just fuck Kevin! I was confused and angry, and I care about him deeply.
Alec: Get your clothes, give me the keys and get out! Now!
Leslie: I can't believe this is happening to us.
Alec: Wasted love!
[Throws football, across the room]
Alec: God, I just wish I could get it back!

the way nelson delivers "you can have all the carly simons" is hilaire

Alec: You cannot have the Pretenders' first album! That's mine.
Leslie: I bought it.
Alec: You did not! You can have all the Billy Joels... except The Stranger.
Leslie: I'm taking Thriller and Mahler's ninth.
Alec: Kevin is so fond of Mahler.
Leslie: I moved in with Jules.
Alec: Oh how nice, roomies again... No Springsteen is leaving this house! You can have all the Carly Simons.
Leslie: You got me those for Valentine's Day. Remember, they're used to be Valentine's Day here, Remember?
Alec: You ran out on this relationship. You take the consequences.
Leslie: I didn't run out on anything. You ran out.
Alec: You fucked Kevin.
Leslie: You fucked many!
Alec: Nameless, faceless many!
Leslie: I feel much better now, thanks.
Alec: You're not taking The Police.
Leslie: Anyway, I didn't just fuck Kevin! I was confused and angry, and I care about him deeply.
Alec: Get your clothes, give me the keys and get out! Now!
Leslie: I can't believe this is happening to us.
Alec: Wasted love!
[Throws football, across the room]
Alec: God, I just wish I could get it back!

YOU FUCKED MANY

that's how realistic dialogue is written people...

i think this movie was where i first learned of gustav mahler's existence

lol xps

also I confess to a TOTAL brain fart re St Elmos Fire/what it has to do with the movie, becuase I totally forgot this lame speech
I love how in 80's movies there's always that scene that explains the title

Billy: Jules, y'know, honey... this isn't real. You know what it is? It's St. Elmo's Fire. Electric flashes of light that appear in dark skies out of nowhere. Sailors would guide entire journeys by it, but the joke was on them... there was no fire. There wasn't even a St. Elmo. They made it up. They made it up because they thought they needed it to keep them going when times got tough, just like you're making up all of this. We're all going through this. It's our time at the edge.

yeah that speech "explains" the title except that it makes no damn sense!

even as a kid i was like "...i am not buying that metaphor one bit."

she's making up her drug problem? coke addiction is a real thing people!

There wasn't even a St. Elmo. They made it up.

LIES

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_XdP6Lp2ceqY/TCyTc34wUdI/AAAAAAAAVZ0/Pc8SjY-YdYs/s1600/st-elmos-fire-big.jpg

Reading through IMDB quotes, there's a definite rhythm to the dialogue...they're all like catchy advertising slogans...it's like if it was written now every scene they planned for a piece of dialogue to go in the trailer.

also there totally was a st elmo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erasmus_of_Formiae

St. Elmo's Fire

YOU FUCKED MANY

Coming Soon

"It's our time at the edge" LOLOL Oh Billy, you with your shirts covered in bats and your saxophone, what does that even MEAN

Erasmus was ... beaten around the head, spat upon and "besprinkled...with foulness.

kinda like what watching this movie is like

His teeth were ... plucked out of his head with iron pincers. And after that they bound him to a pillar and carded his skin with iron cards, and then they roasted him upon a gridiron...and did smite sharp nails of iron in his fingers, and after, they put out his eyes of his head with their fingers, and after that they laid this holy bishop upon the ground naked and stretched him with strong withes bound to horses about his blessed neck, arms, and legs, so that all his veins and sinews that he had in his body burst.

But he didn't have to see Rob Lowe in that getup so it all balances out.

Good call by Alec though on letting her take all the Billy Joels except the Stranger. He's not all bad.

by "that getup" do you mean THE BATS, Ned

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51XwPAvjSqL._SL500_AA280_.jpg

Billy: Jules, y'know, honey... this isn't real. You know what it is? It's St. Elmo's Fire. Electric flashes of light that appear in dark skies out of nowhere. Sailors would guide entire journeys by it, but the joke was on them... there was no fire. There wasn't even a St. Elmo. They made it up. They made it up because they thought they needed it to keep them going when times got tough, just like you're making up all of this. We're all going through this. It's our time at the edge.

This vs. anything Ethan Hawke dribbles out of his mouth in Reality Bites

hottness trumps dialogue Ned

...trying to figure out which one of those is the one you think is hot.

how about BOTH

:D

never underestimate my depravity, sir

YOU FUCKED MANY keeps cracking me up

I really need to watch this movie again, relive all of the many many lols

I'm not sure what I'll do for the rest of my life now that I've seen pic of St. Elmo.

I recommend besprinkling yourself with foulness

hahahahah

isn't he also turning into a republican over the course of the movie? worst

he's like a proto-Gabbneb.

i find some of this movie v moving. i want to find a picture of ally sheedy all red-eyed & eyes-narrowed, looking wounded, or sparring in the kitchen with the drippy-proto-macavoy guy to prove my point.

"drippy-proto-macavoy guy"

Ahem I believe you mean the wonderful Mr. Andrew McCarthy.

yeah i do like him & he's great and kind of weirdly radiant in it?, but it's that he transforms to a v convincing kind of drippy-awful-guy that sorta takes the edge off. like up until he confesses his love with pretty accurate awkwardness he's great.

i just rewatched this, and the act of scanning back afterward to try to correlate the actors with their previous (non-breakfast-club) roles felt like some sort of deep cognitive thought exercise

I watched this for the first time since I was a kid and was repulsed by all of the characters. I couldn't believe how loathsome the movie was, because I remember really liking it when I was younger -- I guess I was taken in by Rob Lowe's handsomeness. And bat t-shirt.

That shirt WAS really awesome.

he looks a bit like a banana playing the saxophone, in that bit. he is playing some real rasping saxophone.

(Man in Motion)

Man in Motion is a fucking kick-ass song. Let me tell you something about that song. Sometimes it'll come on my iPod and I'll get a little extra pep in my step and all of a sudden anything seems possible and it's all I can do to stop myself from just punching the air with enthusiasm. You know why? Because just once in his life a man has his time, and my time is now, I'M COMING ALIVE! Yep.

(hi five)

lol if andrew mccarthy is proto-mcavoy that explains a lot. about me.

but yes this is a repulsive movie filled with repulsive people. i believe it reflects joel schumacher's soul.

love this movie love this movie love this movie

it brings me faith

also YOU FUCKED MANY iirc

lol HS I thought the same about that Mcavoy comment. Love him.

Nameless, faceless Many

Damn this thread for getting the aforementioned "man in motion" single stuck in my head WHICH I CANNOT STAND.

I've never seen this movie.

dead 2 me

alas Trayce, I never knew youse

Ive seen all the other 80s teen canon. Just not that one for some reason.

and you are...?

Andrew McCarthy never became a star because Hollywood only had room for one narrow-mouthed, small-lipped male lead of Irish extraction with a penchant for trying to play "interesting" teen movies. And John Cusack won that battle.

;_; vg

While this movie’s pretty wack (tho fun to watch), it makes me wish there had been a different (better) movie built around the Demi Moore character… played by Moore, of course, who’s excellent in this.

Also, has there ever been a more extraneous character/plotline in a film than Emilio Estevez’s here(??) Someone should make a fan edit that removes that cringy/creepy nonsense (except, of course, the movie’s best line – “They’re laughing!”)