Some Kind of Wonderful (1987)

The three main characters have names relating to The Rolling Stones: Amanda Jones, named after a song of the same name (which is played in the film); a drummer called Watts (Charlie Watts) and a character called Keith, after Keith Richards

I thought Craig Sheffer was so hot, and then he vanished.

I wanted to be Watts so bad when this came out.

One of my favorite movies and soundtracks of all time. I’ve owned this soundtrack on vinyl, tape and CD. Such an underrated, under the radar gem. Saw it in the theater on my 11th bday. Lea Thompson slapping Craig Schaeffer (twice!) while Charlie Sexton’s Beats so Lonely plays in the background? Heaven.

Chynna Phillips' screen debut as Craig Sheffer's secret girlfriend.

I completely forgot about Charlie Sexton being on the soundtrack. Now, there's someone who was so hyped at the time and, yet, whose career fizzled out shortly thereafter.

I didn't see it because I did not like the poster.

Craig Sheffer by Andy Warhol

Candace Cameron's only funny role.

I remember seeing it hoping it was going to be as good as the Molly Ringwald trilogy and being disappointed. Somehow it didn’t have the same energy.

Charlie Sexton has had a very successful career as a studio musician.

Soon after the movie was released, my high school held a fundraiser where they sold tickets to watch the movie in the high school auditorium. That sucked all the cool out of the movie—you were considered a loser if you liked this movie. Teenagers can be weird.

I love this film.

I like this one more than Pretty In Pink but like that one, it would have been better if they'd let the gay-coded best friend actually be gay.

“You look good...wearing my future.” Cue Lick the Tins

[quote] I remember seeing it hoping it was going to be as good as the Molly Ringwald trilogy and being disappointed. Somehow it didn’t have the same energy.

I totally get what you mean.

In retrospect SKOM is actually the more progressive & accomplished movie, with better writing and stronger characters than any of the ‘Molly’ movies. And yet SKOM lacks the bright effervescence of PRETTY IN PINK, or the giggly snappy angst of THE BREAKFAST CLUB. Even sugary SIXTEEN CANDLES seems more fun and better-paced, somehow. SKOM is heartfelt and achingly real, but dreary as well.

"Go get your skag." [sniffle]

As with all of the Hughes movies, I saw SKOW the day it opened, and I've got to say, I found it a huge disappointment and completely unmemorable. And I've always despised Elias Koteas.

Isn't this the movie Molly and John had a falling out over?

I don’t think this played in the sticks.

It was emo before there was emo.

Too dreary and seemed dated even for the 80s

It was also a pretty homely cast

"Break his heart, I'll break your face."

People quoting a movie that few have seen and that fewer have enjoyed cracks me up.

R24. obviously has a lot going on

No r25, he's just B-A-S-I-C.

"This is my church."

"I'd rather be alone for the right reasons than with someone for the wrong reasons."

Terrible film with an even worse cast. Mary Stuart Masterson is deservedly forgotten today. And Eric Stoltz peaked with Mask. Charisma minus. This was the final nail in the coffin of John Hughes teen films. Of course, he then went on to do a bunch of lousy kids films.

I loved the soundtrack. Leah Thompson is always awful to me, so she's my real complaint. I'd have chosen Watts, too.

This movie holds up well, and I watch it whenever it's on.

I like Stoltz in Mr Jealousy and Kicking and Screaming. Of course, he’s also good in Pulp Fiction.

Does anybody find Lea Thompson appealing? I assume that her career is due to nepotism.

“This girl is clearly in the midst of an emotional shoot out to consent to date YOU, the human tator tot.”

- Laura

"Co-ed Phys-Ed..."

Keith Nelson: You can't tell a book by its cover.

Watts: No, but you can tell how much it's gonna cost.

You know, exposing your skin to sunlight will make you old before your time, and eventually you'll look like an albino raisin.

Fun trivia fact: Eric Stoltz and Elias Koteas would later go on to act together in The Prophecy (1995). Eric Stoltz and Craig Sheffer would later go on to act together in Sleep With Me (1994).

"With Coolidge at the helm, they filmed a few weeks with Keith having hair below his shoulders. “I was very greasy and odd looking. Because the guy was someone who wasn’t able to fit in, we thought that was a great way to go,” Stoltz told Moviehole. When Coolidge was fired, they shut down production. “Someone at Paramount came down and said, ‘We’re going to cut your hair, and clean up your act.’ I said, ‘But the role is a rebel who doesn’t fit in.’ They said, ‘You’re going to cut your hair, and we’ll clean you up.’ I said, ‘Oh, so this is how the world works.’” Stoltz also had to wear eyeliner and blush."

More at the link:

"Did John Hughes recently suffer brain damage?"

I guess that in the painting Keith does of Amanda, she is supposed to look supressed like the world is pressing down on her, but from the first time I saw it I thought she looked like an unfortunate garden gnome with scoliosis.

Art criticism in detention. Making friends.

One of my fav John Hughes films...I watch it anytime it’s on. Just love the characters and the story.

Saw this when it was released in theatres. Loved it. You people are twats!

I get more nostalgic watching this than other John Hughes movies. Probably since it hasn't been played to death.

I love it too! I identify with the characters more than those in other Hughes films.

Eric stoltz at his cutest but the.most.boring.movie.ever!

Eric's definitely very cute in this movie but I also like him with long hair (Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Pulp Fiction, etc.)

I wonder if Amanda's friend, Shayne, ever hooked up with the long-haired dude with the quivering lip. They seemed to have had a moment towards the end of the film.

I'm sure that they did, R48. She took him to Aspen. Or Chile.

I saw Shayne in LA in November and fanboyed silently.

Lea Thompsons character is supposed to be the hottest most desirable girl in the whole school ?

Molly Ringwald was supposed to be one of the hottest girls in high school in The Breakfast Club. All three guys liked her. Sixteen Candles, she had a hot guy and a dorky guy in love with her. And then Pretty in Pink she had Jon Cryer, Andrew McCarthy and James Spader all interested in her.

From R52’s list, it occurs to me that perhaps what SKOM lacked was a villain.

There were crims & punks & snobs & creepy yupheads in it, but no infuriating & alluring arch-asshole like a Steff McKee to cathartise the audience and throw the sympathetic characters into greater relief.

I also want to add that James Spader has shared the best chemistry with Ringwald of any of her several leading men, but Hughes inexplicably failed to use this in PIP.

Hughes also miscast SKOM by hiring Stoltz, who I fear has never had chemistry with anyone. MSM had to do all his heavy lifting.

Some great moments and characters (and a great soundtrack) but holy shit does this movie add up to a pile of emo nonsense. Wiping out your savings to buy the (wrong) woman a pair of diamond earrings is not some noble, deep act. It's just fucking stupid. And obsessing about being an outcast while the asshole rich jock gets the pretty girl is not OMG so deep! It's just kind of pathetic.

The worst thing John Hughes did to teenagers was encourage them to think the stupidest shit they obsessed over was really truly OMG SO SERIOUS AND IMPORTANT. Gen Xers and millennials can thank him for their emotional arrested development. Heathers captured the sick absurdity of hierarchy of high school better than all his movies combined.

Claire isn’t one of the hottest girls in the Breakfast Club school, she’s one of the most popular.

Did you go to high school in suburban America? There can be a big difference between Pretty/Sexy and Popular when it comes to cliques.

From R38's link:

"Both in the movie and the script, he gives her a pair of diamond earrings and says, “You look good wearing my future.” In the film, the credits start to roll, but in the script she says, “These babies go back in the morning. You’re going to art school.” He replies with, “We’ll keep one and make it a ring,” insinuating they should get married. Sensing his uncertainty, Drummer Girl says, “You don’t want to think about that one, do you?” They continue to banter for about a page more, about how that moment was her first kiss, and then Keith jokes she did it wrong."

That would have been a lot better and more true to the characters (at least her).

Also, in both 16 Candles and Pretty in Pink, the Molly characters are contrasted with the sexy girls. In both movies, the studs choose “homely” Molly because she’s authentic and likable, unlike the nasty, superficial pretty and popular girls.

That’s kind of the whole point of both movies.

Popularity trumps appearance in high school, and many not-so-hot people date out of their league.

Yeah, Claire in TBC isn't "hot" so much as she's super wealthy/connected and has the means to always look pretty and photo-ready.

Think "my father invented Toaster Strudels" girl in Mean Girls.

[quote] In both 16 Candles and Pretty in Pink, the Molly characters are contrasted with the sexy girls. In both movies, the studs choose “homely” Molly because she’s authentic and likable, unlike the nasty, superficial pretty and popular girls.

R58 true, to an extent.

It’s worth pointing though that in both films, Molly’s ‘poor’ character (in actual fact, comfortably lower-middle class, owning a car and disposable income) pines more after material things & wealth/status than she does her suitors. Neither can fairly be called superficial, but perhaps materialistic and status-conscious (which in a Madonna-era was de riguer, I suppose). Andie In ‘Pretty in Pink’ lies about who she is to her boyfriend to impress him, and moreover pretends to be into things she’s not. That’s not terribly authentic or secure, but what teenage girl is either of those?

Both girls have also got a sharp tongue, which they use to deal with the pestering horndog boys surrounding. Molly’s character Sam in ‘Sixteen Candles’ calls Anthony Michael-Hall’s geek a “fag” and a “dweeb” and ices him out multiple times for creeping on her. In ‘Pretty in Pink’ Andie is rude & condescending to several others leading Steff - Spader’s dbag character - to memorably call her a “bitch” for acting this way. So maybe she’s not so nice, either.

But given the way those characters were treated, why should they have to be nice? Or deep? Or even ‘authentic’? This is where Hughes got it so right with Watts, who was was allowed to have a major attitude without other characters shaming her or forcing her to change to please them.

I saw it in the theater, i thought it was one of the greatest movies ever made.

Am I the only one who finds Eric Stoltz totally adorable and charming and at peak adorableness in this movie??

[quote] Am I the only one who finds Eric Stoltz totally adorable and charming and at peak adorableness in this movie??

Yes.

I still think Eric Stoltz would have done a decent job if he had been allowed to complete Back to the Future.

[R18] John Hughes wanted Molly to play AMANDA Jones, the role played by Lea Thompson. She didn't take it because it was too similar in theme to Pretty in PInk and she went to go make King Lear in France with Jean-Luc Godard.

No, BTTF needed MJF’s charisma and comedy skills to sell the icky “sex with mom” stuff.

R67 I need an interpretation

BTTF is Back to the Future

MJF is Michael J Fox

“Sex with Mom” stuff is a major plot point of BTTF

Did it have a scene where they end up on the black side of town with hilarious results? Any weird racist shit played for laughs?

R53, there was a rich asshole villain in SKOW.

The thing I loved most about that movie, upon rewatching recently, was seeing 80s LA. And pondering the lifestyles of the characters. They were so independent! High school kids nowadays don’t have jobs after school! Or at least none of the one I know do.

Craig Sheffer's character was almost identical to James Spader's character in Pretty in Pink. Even to the point of them both having parties in their big houses.

All this time I was picturing Craig Schaeffer when I saw the name Craig Sheffer.

That's Eric Schaeffer, you dumb fuck.

Ha ha, sorry Eric Shaeffer!

I thought it was going to be Kim Delaney and Kyle MacLaughlan. Kim was hot off AMC.

R55- I want to marry you and have your babies.

I love the closing version of "I Can't Help Falling in Love With You.'

Me too. Lick the Tins. It was the best.

"You look good wearing my future."

John Hughes wanted Lucy to be in this movie but Gary talked her out of it.

Shayne played the other therapist in Big Little Lies, the one who evaluates the cute kid who didn't do it.

I had a friend in school who actually resembled Mary Stuart Masterson, ended up cutting her hair like hers in the movie, and is now out and proud in San Francisco.

This is one of the few movies I can still watch from the eighties that I'm not completely tired of seeing.

If this movie were made today, Watts would have been a lesbian and they would have skipped the whole crush on Keith part.

R85, lots of people thought that Watts was lez and her real interest was Amanda.

i think the idea of having Keith as the long haired art student loner makes a lot more sense than the version of Keith in the movie. Even when i saw this movie when it came out i thought he was kind of dorky looking and more nerdy than artsy

[quote] If this movie were made today, Watts would have been a lesbian and they would have skipped the whole crush on Keith part. EW interviewed Eric Stoltz and Mary Stuart Masterson and Masterson revealed that originally Watts was to have gender identity issues.

Matetson:... But, you know, [Some Kind of Wonderful] was very different originally. Very, very different.

How so? Masterson There was the first draft that was sort of like a broader sex comedy. It opened with Keith [masturbating] into his pillow. Stoltz Oh, the things that won’t make it into publication… Masterson Also, my character was named Keith and she wanted to be male.

Did your characters still end up together? Masterson Yeah, that was the strange part. But the script evolved, because [originally] there was another director. Stoltz That version was much darker.

Mary Stuart Masterson was great in the film At Cloase Range.

I was on a Paramount mailing list in the 80s, and one day in the mail I got a Some Kind of Wonderful poster, 8x10 cast photos, and other promotional memorabilia months before the movie came out. I'm sure they don't do anything like that to promote films today.

I always watch it when it comes on

When does it come on? I don’t think I’ve ever come across it on TV.

It's on cable movie channels every few weeks

I like it better than Pretty In Pink. Stoltz is a much better actor than Ringwald.

God, I hated ALL those John Hughes teenage movies. The unreal "teenagers" were so obviously the product of a filmmaker's frat boy imagination. "Jake Ryan" was one of his more implausible creations: "the most popular kid in school", a drop dead handsome rich boy who dumps his hot cheerleader girlfriend for a geeky freshman girl because he just wants somebody to really love him. thus making "Sixteen Candles" enter the realm of science fiction. Hughe's movies appealed to a particular audience but my God they were SO bad.

Eric Stolz was so beautiful.

'John Hughes was a romantic. He was in love with love': An oral history of Some Kind of Wonderful

this was the only movie I ever saw at the Chinese Theatre in LA, I was out there on a working vaca, distributing my songwriter demo tape. Lea Thompson wasn't as hip as Molly Ringwald and this film is directed by Howard Deutsch her husband and John Hughes produced it. I want to Elias Koteas to sit on my face and piss on me. Charlie Sexton & Craig Scheffer had drug problems that derailed their careers, I had tix to Sexton at the Bottom Line and he didn't show up. I had the soundtrack album but to me it wasn't as good as the other Hughes soundtracks. Did they ever do a box set of them? too bad cds are gone.

Sexy man, sexy voice. MSM was a great choice also. Not as strong a film as the others of the era, I still prefer it because of Eric.

It was joyless compared to the Molly trilogy.

The consensus among my friends at the time was that MSM was much more appealing than Lea Thompson. I agree with the posters who said Lea must have had the benefit of nepotism, she was never hot, or even mildly interesting.

I suppose I'm in the minority here, but I liked Lea Thompson in this. She gives what otherwise would be a one-dimensional character some depth and had more of an introspective quality than I think Molly would have brought to the role. This was very well cast all around.

R102, the role was originally going to be played by Kim Delaney

I met Lea Thompson circa 1980 she and Dennis Quaid were standing on line ahead of me for "Vacation" on the Upper West Side. I engaged her in conversation and both were very sweet.

I liked the Mad Magazine parody Dumb Kind of Wonderful

I own a small vintage shop in LA and one day Lea Thompson came in looking haggard as fuck. She was with a lesbian who turned out to be really sweet but Lea was a CUNT! I said hello and to let me know if I could help them with anything. Lea scoffed and ran out of the shop. Her friend looked at me and smiled and told me how much she loved my store. It was so fucking weird.

Off topic but my nicest celebrity client is Jennifer Coolidge.

I liked the artsiness of San Pedro in the movie and considered moving there when I relocated to LA, but ended up in Redondo Beach instead. I still liked hanging out there and going to the vintage shops and one of those grand old movie palaces.

I always remember Maddie Corman who played Eric’s sister in the movie. I saw her at a Starbucks a few years ago, but didn’t have the nerve to say “Hi.”

R106, totally off-topic but I’d be interested in hearing about your store. Where do you get your merchandise? It seems like a great/fun business. Do you get shoplifters?

I thought Eric Stoltz was cute in this. I masturbated to his full frontal nude scenes in Haunted Summer and Naked in New York.

Maddie Corman's mom died before the movie started filming, and she told her Mom she had the role before she had been officially cast.

R108 Shoplifting is definitely a problem. I am actually moving my shop to an upstairs location in The Apparel Mart and I think that will curb most of that problem. It's a fun business and I have some good sources for vintage so I don't have to go out digging like I used to. I recently got in 150 pieces of deadstock with tags from the 70s that could have wardrobed the cast of "Charlie's Angels" for a good three seasons.

Eric was adorable in this. R109 But man I hope it’s a grower.

This movie is a thousand times better if you pretend “Watts” is a little bottom boy and Keith is bi.