Figure 1.--"Ferris Bueller's Day Off" is a good look at dress trends and life styles in an American high school. The film is developing a cult status. Here the main characters are outside a posh Chicago restaurant dressed in a way that under ordinary circumstances would never allow them to be admitted. Cameron wears his red hockey jersey and Ferris wears a windbreaker with a commando's military beret--a symbol of protest, obviously, with overtones of Che Guevara. All three of the children wear dark glasses, partly to disguise their youth (they are too young to drink alcohol legally) and partly to look like movie stars or celebrities.

"Ferris Bueller's Day Off" is a good look at dress trends and life styles in an American high school. Ferris plays hookey, but he is no ordinary truant. The point of his exercise is not to waste the day, but to spend it wisely. He devises a series of elaborate deceptions to ensure that he and two friends can spend a care free day away from school. A reader reports, "I absolutely love this movie. Everytime my history teacher asks a question, she usually says,"Anyone, Anyone." It usually makes me laugh, because I think of this movie." A reader writes, "Gawd I loved this movie! Every time I hear 'Twist and Shout' by the Beatles I remember this movie. All the tricks Matthew Broderick had up his sleeve to get his girlfriend and Cameron out of school for the day, getting a hold of Cameron's dad's classic Ferrari, whooping it up in Chicago, going to the Cubs' game at Wrigley Field, everyone thinking that Ferris was dying of some horrible disease and how he was able to fool everyone with his computer and stereo set up in his room, just priceless stuff!" This film is developing cult status.

Filmology

This film has become almost a cult movie among highschool teenagers because of its representation of upper middle-class teenage rebellion in the affluent suburbs (the North Shore) of Chicago during the 1980s. It's historically interesting for that reason, but it also illustrates what boys thought was "cool" to wear in the 1980s, especially in affluent North shore Chicago suburbs. The film was directed by John Hughes.

Cast

The film starred the young Matthew Broderick as Ferris Bueller (aged about 17). His best friend, Cameron Frye (who is also undergoing some mild alienation from his father) is played excellently by Alan Ruck. Ferris's girlfriend, Sloane Peterson, is fetchingly acted by Mia Sara. The bumbling highschool Dean of Students, Jeffery Jones, is played amusingly in a kind of slapstick way by Ed Rooney.

Figure 2.--This image shows Ferris racing to get home in time to beat his parents to his bedroom, where they will come to check on him in bed. He barely makes it. He races through backyards, over fences, etc. to make his destination on time. He wears tan slacks, a windbreaker, and an outlandish low-cut leopard- skin design vest--a deliberate bit of bad taste which he obviously considers "cool" and an act of rebellion against the genteel conventions of his class.

Plot

Ferris plays hookey, but he is no ordinary truant. The point of his exercise is not to waste the day, but to spend it wisely. He devises a series of elaborate deceptions to ensure that he and two friends can spend a care free day away from school. Ferris and his friend Cameron, two teenage boys, feign sickness to their parents so as to take a day off from highschool and have various adventures in downtown Chicago. They "borrow" (without permission of course) the prize sportscar of Cameron's father, a red Ferrari beautifully restored, and eventually manage to destroy it in the garage where it is kept by letting it drop off a ledge into a ravine. We don't see the boys being punished, but we can imagine that Cameron's father, who seems to love his sports car a bit more than his wiseacre son, will come down pretty hard on the boy. Still the film has a comic and seemingly happy ending, because Ferris who pretends to be ill for the day while his parents are away manages to race home after his highjinks in the city and get himself into the bed where he has supposedly been languishing all day. His parents, who seem none too bright, never figure out that he's really not sick at all but has been playing hooky from school. The story is a sort of modern twist on Huck Finn. The boys have a lot of fun trying to be "cool" in the big city and fantasizing that they are adults, but they are essentially innocents, though quite clever and resourceful innocents when it comes to deception. Their adventures are quite amusing. They visit the top of the Sears Tower and get squeamish looking down dizzily into the street from such a height. They try to fake their way into a fashionable restaurant without the proper attire; they visit a baseball game at Wrigley Field, and gawk at some of the magnificent masterpieces at the Art Institute. They interrupt a German-American Day parade in the Loop by leaping onto the float and seizing a microphone to sing a popular song while accompanied by the German band. They valet-park the Ferrari only to have the attendants highjack the car and joyride around town in it. Cameron's treatment of his father's car--first stealing it and then finally wrecking it in his father's garage--is supposed to be received with a degree of sympathy as an act of protest against the affluent father's materialism and status- seeking while neglecting the emotional needs of his teenage son.

Costuming

"Ferris Bueller's Day Off" is a good look at dress trends and life styles in an American high school. It is interesting for HBC because of its representation of typical 1980s "cool" highschool dress.

Reader Comments

A reader reports, "I absolutely love this movie. Everytime my history teacher asks a question, she usually says,"Anyone, Anyone." It usually makes me laugh, because I think of this movie." A reader writes, "Gawd I loved this movie! Every time I hear 'Twist and Shout' by the Beatles I remember this movie. All the tricks Matthew Broderick had up his sleeve to get his girlfriend and Cameron out of school for the day, getting a hold of Cameron's dad's classic Ferrari, whooping it up in Chicago, going to the Cubs' game at Wrigley Field, everyone thinking that Ferris was dying of some horrible disease and how he was able to fool everyone with his computer and stereo set up in his room, just priceless stuff!" status.

Created: February 14, 2004
Last updated: February 14, 2004