You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried

The media is a drug. It affects you like a disease. It cures you like a miracle. That’s what The Breakfast Club had done to the 1980’s it exploded with excitement and emotions where the fans went wild for a new crew of young and vibrant actors for a unique and exciting time. This page- turning novel was written by Susannah Gora and published by Crown Publishers. Your Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried is a wonderful biography on the making of the famous 1980 movies by John Hughes. You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried is Susannah Gora’s first novel, but she has written for many magazines and television shows and is even the host and writer of “Classics on Film” a DVD series. You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried is a marvelous, witty, novel with a very clever input.


“Those very words were mirrored in the kind of impact The Breakfast Club would- have it become one of a group of seminal 180 youth films that broke the rules of teen movies, bared young people’s souls, and touched a generation in ways they’d never dreamed possible.”

The movies that are mentioned in You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried includes life-changing movies such as The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Some Kind Of Wonderful, and Sixteen Candles.


“The Breakfast Club are asked by the principal, Richard Vernon (Paul Gleason), to write an essay answering the question. “Who do you think you are?” Over the course of the day together, the five teens learn to trust one another, and it’s decided that Brian (Anthony Michael Hall), the brain, will write one essay representing the entire group. There, in his green sweatshirt and high-waisted khaki pants, Brian writes:

Dear Mr. Vernon,
We accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was we did wrong. But we think you’re crazy to make us write an essay telling us who you think we are. What do you care? You see us as you want to see us, in the simplest terms, and the most convenient definitions. You see us as a brain, an athlete, a basketcase, a princess, and a criminal. --- correct? That’s the way we saw each other at seven o’ clock this morning. We were brainwashed. But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain, and an athlete, and a basketcase, a princess, and a criminal.
Does that answer your question?


At the end of the day in detention, Brian kisses the very notebook paper his essay is written on, proud of his work.” (Gora 7)


If you haven’t seen the movie The Breakfast Club you will find out that when the five teens attend school Monday morning they will act as if they had never even met. In most high schools their are all kinds of cliques. The princess, Clair would be in the popular group. The athlete, Andrew would be in the jock group. The brain, Brian would be in the nerdy group. The criminal, John would be with the freaks, and the basketcase, Allison was a roamer. She would talk to anyone and everyone who was nice enough to talk to. All five teens wishing to be friends, they instead put the judgment of other classmates and the opinions of others before their own. The Breakfast Club is a movie that teaches a life long lesson that everyone should remember. Why should you care what other people think of you? As Allison said after the five teens were discussing what will happen Monday morning. Allison said, I don’t the kind of friends I would have would mind. Responding to what Brian asked, Who else would not ignore each other on Monday? The people like Allison we need more of. Allison stood up for herself and wouldn’t let any other persons judgment get in her way. The Breakfast Club is an extraordinary movie which will never be forgotten by it’s Brat Pack fans.


The day of 1983 Sixteen Candles was on the scene with John Hughes the director of the movie was even more ecstatic for his second film, his first being The Breakfast Club.


“The script for Sixteen Candles made clear that a comedic and light teenage film could also contain within it an examination of the deeper contours of adolescent life.” (Gora 26) “In Sixteen Candles, the story that John Hughes crafted for her, Ringwald would star as Samantha Baker, a charmingly ordinary everyday girl whose family is so wrapped up prepping for her ditzy older sister’s wedding that they completely forget her sixteenth birthday. Sam’s embarrassing grandparents including a grandmother who feels her up and exclaims, “She’s gotten her boobies!” --- have descended on her family’s home for the wedding weekend, alone with an Asian exchange student named Long Duk Dong. The socially awkward Sam is hopelessly in love with a popular senior in her high school, the dreamy Jake Ryan, while a gangly jokester known simply as “The Geek” lusts after her. But by story’s end, Sam wins the heart of Jake Ryan. In a Hollywood ending, it turns out that the most popular boy in school is also kind and sensitive --- in other words, he has a heart worth winning.” (Gora 26)

Don’t you wish life could always end in a happy ending. Hollywood is known for their classic endings. Where boy meets girl, popular and unpopular, naughty and nice, whatever you want to call it, but that’s how it usually ends in a lot of romance kind of movies. Which is what exactly happened in The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles. What other option does Hollywood have? What kind of movie would it be if Samantha Baker never won her dream guy and she never got her birthday acknowledged? It would be a complete let down, and it would make Hollywood look like they have a big frowny face bill boarded for all teens in America too see. That’s what teens are looking for dreams, passions, determination and happy endings not sad endings. This movies life lesson is even when things are down, and you don’t feel like you aren’t worth a darn, you really and truly are.


The current date is March 1985 in New York City getting ready to film Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. The movie is about “The titular character that may be a kid ditching school to spend an adventurous day in the sunshine with his friends, but he’s also something of a sage, possessing deep wisdom about savoring our brief time on this earth. (“The question isn’t what are we going to do,” Ferris tells his friends before setting off on their day of freedom. “The question is, What aren’t we going to do?”) Ferris says Tom Jacobson, who coproduces the film, “is almost a magical character. He is a showman and a storyteller, and he has this exuberance that is a celebration of life.” It’s why today you’d be hard-pressed to find an American high school yearbook that doesn’t quote somewhere in it’s pages Ferris Bueller’s view on existence: “Life moves pretty fast. if you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it.” (Gora 175)


Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is one of the most funny and enduring movies of all time. This movie has a huge point for all Americans to hear on out. Yes, Ferris Bueller is skipping school and lying to his parents about being sick. Yes, none of these things are good, but Ferris Bueller had a big point to make when he said “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it.” What he’s trying to prove hear is school is required, learning is needed, but have fun once a while. Don’t take life so seriously. Do the things that you have always wanted to do. It doesn’t have to be two years from now, it doesn’t always have to cost money, do the simple fun things that you have always wanted to do, and when the time comes for you to say your goodbyes you will know that your life was fulfilled and you did anything and everything to celebrate your life on this earth.


Hollywood wanted more teen dramas to produce. So here comes the next teen fling Some Kind Of Wonderful. “This movie was more of an antic, silly movie. It was about a kid who was a total geek in school, and his friends are geeks, and he gets up the nerve to ask the prettiest girl in school to the prom.” She’s trying to piss off her boyfriend at the time, so she says yes. When he finds out that that’s the only reason that she’d said yes, he decides that he’s going to take her out on the date of her life.” This date was over the top, rather literally: It featured a fly-over from the Blue Angles, the showy flight demonstration team of the U.S. Navy, and had a light, humorous touch.” (Gora 207)


Courage, cool, and creative explains the moral of Some Kind Of Wonderful. Stoltz, the guy who asked out the popular girl. Had great courage to ask that girl out, and he had creative ways on trying to win her over. The life lesson from this movie is you never know what’s behind another door once you open that one door. Stoltz, was so focused on trying to win the popular girl that eh didn’t even realize the best girl for him was right infront of him. Theirs always many possibilities and chances in life, and you have to pick and choose which one you want to take and which one you want to leave behind.


“Fastimes at Ridgemont High would, in many ways, open the door for the youth films John Hughes and his contemporary would make in the mid-and late 1980’s by providing early on that youth audience of that decade were hungering for entertainment that was amusing but that still took their struggles seriously. Sure, Fast Times a relaxed vibe, thanks to its Southern California setting, shots of kids hanging out in pools, and Sean Penn’s inimitable stoner --- surfer dude Jeff Spicoli. But it was also, says Heckering, “completely realistic, based on Cameron Crowe’s journalistic look and honest reporting of what was going on.” “Unlike the teens of movies past, the Fast Times kids had real problems that weren’t entirely played for laughs or melodrama --- from the mundane (dealing with lousy bosses at their mall jobs) to the heavy (Jennifer Jason Leigh’s character loses her virginity and eventually has an abortion). “I wanted to show kids who actually had problems that were bigger than what a kid could handle,” says Heckerling. “To me, that’s what Fast Times --- the title Cameron had given it --- meant. The times are too fast for the maturity these people have. And that meant something to me.” (Gora 22)


The moral of Fast Times is that life goes by so fast, especially when your in high school and even though your still in high school your still responsible for your actions and what you do is your fault not anyone else’s fault. You should always be more safe then sorry.


You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried is an incredible, well-rounded novel with the taste of nostalgia.

“It’s been decades since the movies flickered in theaters across America and yet, for those who grew up watching them, the films stories run on a nonstop loop in their hearts, against the aching beat of a synth – pop New Wave song. As adults, many of them let the movies lessons inform the way they live, often in very significant ways.” (Gora 1)


I recommend this novel to anyone who is interested in the 1980’s, movies, film making, or anything retro. You Couldn’t Ignore Me If You Tried could be a top seller. It is an incredible, page turning and all round amazing book.