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It’s a quiet Saturday night, and I’ve just finished watching “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. (For those who haven’t had the, erm, pleasure, it’s a John Hughes teen cult film from 1986 or so. Hughes also did “Pretty in Pink” and “The Breakfast Club”, both of which I’ve seen, so I was slightly curious.)
Frankly, it was a bizarre experience. I know that teen tastes are more changeable than most with the passage of time, but “Ferris” just left me completely nonplussed. It isn’t tragic or funny. There’s precious little plot (boy, best friend and girlfriend take the day off school and muck about, teacher tries to catch them but fails, and that’s literally it) and the characterization is non-existent (Ferris is lucky - which is a circumstance, not a character trait - his friend is uptight, and his sister’s angry at his good fortune, and that’s literally it). The acting is particularly abysmal - especially from Mia Sara, who plays Ferris’s girlfriend. She delivers her lines deadpan and stares vaguely into the middle distance throughout - she could be contemplating love, homework, the possibility of interplanetary space travel or haemmorhoids for all we know.
Weirdest of all is the complete lack of any moral compass or message - Ferris, who has rich parents and friends, stands for absolutely nothing apart from “taking it easy”; he’s not even rebelling against anything. All he does is skip school, go to a museum, have lunch in a fancy restaurant, lounge around in a hot tub and sing a couple of karaoke numbers at a parade, then get back in time for tea. He doesn’t drink, smoke or do drugs, and he fully intends to graduate and go to college. His actions have no consequences (and we’re not shown what becomes of his hapless friend who has trashed his dad’s priceless Ferrari) - but more importantly, they don’t seem to have any purpose either; nothing is achieved, none of the characters learn anything. And if the message is supposed to be “par-taaay”, then frankly I think I’d have more fun at a meeting of the Folkestone and District Table-Tennis Committee than Ferris manages on his “Day Off”.
The film was reasonably successful (Stateside at least), and John Hughes retains some cachet as a “cult” director, albeit very much of his time; I’m interested to know what our American correspondents made of it. Am I missing something deep, or is it just completely vapid?
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It’s basically a celebration of young, upper-middle-class, mid-America society within a larger society of no real consequence. John Hughes goes for “Leave it to Beaver” level criticism of society; with implicit sex thrown in; probably because sex with a teenager girl is something a geek like him only ever dreamed about. Even into adulthood it must still have seemed very groovy indeed.
WAAAY off on a tangent: I know I, too, am supposed pine for the innocence we’ve lost post-50s, but I’m not one for that. It seems to me an almost altogether horrid time, and the height of collective thinking and living–at least in America. We’re very proud over here of our resistance to communism, but you couldn’t have found a better poster-child than the US, circa 1955. Pay your taxes; serve in War X; go to work at government-subsidized Corporation Y; dress yourselves and your family like the catalog shows, and we’ll guarantee you a government-backed housing loan; a better-than-average public education for your kids; meatloaf on Tuesday and barbeque on Saturday; and no riff-raff on the streets after ten o’clock.
So, nope; you got it. I am intrigued at your surprise of no moral compass, and even more intrigued that you should find it lacking. What good is a compass without a magnetic north?
I’m with you entirely on the “innocence” of the ’50s - the US can’t have been a particularly nice to live if you didn’t fit in for whatever reason - hence the earth-shattering impact of the idea of rebellion without a cause. The same is probably true on our side of the pond; I doubt if a wild-eyed maverick such as myself would have cut the mustard as an ideal nuclear (in all senses of the world) paterfamilias in grim 1950s Britannia.
As regards moral compasses - it was a slightly clumsy phrase. I was concerned more with the film’s complete lack of continuity than its lack of moral messages. I’m not asking for an explicitly-codified and strictly-observed doctrine of right and wrong in every film I see (although there’s nothing wrong with one being there), but, for the sake of the story’s credibility, actions need to have SOME kind of consequence. It wasn’t that “Ferris Bueller” was immoral, or even amoral - it was just unhh-moral.
Oh, and I’m more of a true north man myself…
First: witty response. Point goes to tafkass.
However; I’m not surprised–I’m intrigued. Call it magnetic; call it true; slap my ass and call me Sally*, but your appeal to an a priori morality encourages me.
*“Naked Gun”, I think; it might be “Airplane!”.
Apols, Hotdog - slightly unfairly, I completely changed the second para of my last entry immediately after posting it, reckoning the first one a bit glib; the revised version might be a bit more considered.
Weighing from the other side of the pond:
I haven’t seen the movie in years. The best thing about it is it the cameo that represents the last time anyone in the reality-based community liked Ben Stein (”… blank D-O-O economics … anybody? Anybody?”)
I kind of liked the angsty friend for part of the movie. A few other lines of dialog were funny and were quotable for a short while afterwards. If it was good at anything, it was good at caricaturing the apathy and boredom of high school kids from the suburbs. But no, I don’t think you missed anything.
As for your estimation of the girlfriend, all I can say is I didn’t even remember that he had one, which probably means your estimation is correct.
Cheers, our Bren. Ben Stein - well, I never. Had it not been for your post, I would never have discovered that the “monotonous teacher” cameo in Ferris Bueller was a well-known creationist pro-life scriptwriter for Richard Nixon… you crazy transatlantics!
Watch it again. You’ll be astonished at how crappy and of-its-era it is. Musical equivalent? Wang Chung.
Musical equivalent? Wang Chung.
Ouch! Putdown of the year!
I have to say there is very little likelihood that I’d ever watch that movie again. I am happy to take your word as confirming my memory of its mundaneness.
And re: Ben Stein: Yeah, we’ve got all kinds of religious crazies over here and I’m not at all happy about it. On a related note, I trust you saw this.
“Reality-based community”. Isn’t that cute! I don’t even have to bother with an apology of we religious crazies, because the idea that you inhabit a reality only world is false on it’s face. The only thing utterly provable thing–mathematics, for those of you playing along at home–is entirely imagined. In fact, it may be that the only real separation between humans and the rest of the mammals that enables our dominance (which, however you slice it, has to be considered pretty damned convenient) is our ability to imagine things.
I did try to find that article, but it seems to have blown up; no doubt some religious fundamentalists are once again thwarting the truth. The truth, as best I can tell from the snippet, is that some people think that religious ideas are destructive, and–as we all know–all religious ideas are the same. Quakers are exactly as bad for society as Assassins, or bloodthirsty Crusaders. That’s got to be important, right? What some people somewhere think about all religions everywhere must be, I mean gosh, foundational!
If you can’t work out that a group that cares to ask its “victims” what they think about the manner in which they are “victimized”, is thunderously different than groups that sets about a daily task of murder with absolutely no input from their victims…well, I just have to say that is profoundly stupid, and you’d be better served by not putting it on exhibition.
It’s my experience that the kind of person who refers to us as religious crazies is not ever happy about much of anything. I have a soft-spot for C. Hitchens, but, egads, look at him–I don’t think he remembers the last time he was happy.
I suspected that you two might cross swords eventually… maybe a quick introduction?
Bren, meet Hotdog, Hotdog, this is Bren. I know Hotdog, Texas’s finest, from our time together in the warm bosom of LZ’ blogular embrace, and we’ve had some epic and very enjoyable tussles already. Our opinions appear to differ on quite a lot of things, but anyone who likes the Black Crowes and “The Princess Bride” must be thinking straight at a fairly basic level.
Native New York (State)-er Bren on the other hand joins us via Kyklops’s mighty throbbing organ; we’ve had fewer heated debates, but that’s probably because we have more beliefs in common (and BTW, H - he generally appears quite happy and not stupid in the slightest).
I doubt if you two will be voting the same way come November, but in the ecumenical (with a small “e”) surrounds of Very Poor, you’re both mightily welcome.
Bren - I didn’t see the Rowntree report (and shamefully, haven’t been over to chez vous for a week or so), but I’m not entirely surprised - the darker parts of “religion” get a fairly hefty and regular walloping over here from more than one angle of the press (not just the Guardian / BBC other “liberals”*). Hence if you asked UK inhabitants to word-associate “religion”, they’d more likely than not come back with answers involving radical Islam, Catholic paedophile priests, scientologists, money-grabbing American TV evangelists or the like.
Yet if you ask them whether they’re happy that the UK has the Church of England as its state religion, they’d probably say “yes”. And if you asked them “what religion are you?”, 70% (I think) of people here would even still call themselves C of E. So this is really more about media soundbitery than firmly-held anti-religious convictions. All that said, we’re a hell of a lot more secular than you guys over in the US, and this shouldn’t be discounted.
* - BTW, Hotdog, you never answered my question from our last set-to: “Can you define “progressives”? Am I a progressive? Is it the same as a “liberal”? Do these words actually MEAN anything, or are they just buzzwords used to demonise the enemies of the right?”
Heh. You said ‘bosom”.
Sorry, LZ, that was a bit Beavis and Butthead, wasn’t it?
I appreciate the ecumenical aspect of the Poor House, and–I must add–relish my relatively uncontested role as Unenlightened Savage.
For the record, I did not say he was stupid; I said his comment was. However, I was called a “crazy”.
I am trying to remember not to use the term “Liberal” because I think it is confusing since I am the liberal one, but I have been less than successful.
“Can I define progressives?” This reminds me of the pornography debate: Can you define pornography? Well, the people who run and patronize pornography stores seem to know when they see it. Nevertheless, I’ll give it a shot. Progressives are the people that subscribe to the ideology that there is a perfect sort of man and society, that they are attainable, that they are attainable through secular means, and the best way to go about attaining them is through regulation of those two things. They have their beginnings in Plato’s “Republic”, and their crescendo in the works of Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche; which is the holy trinity of secularism.* That’s about as concise and yet still encompassing as I can be.
“Do they MEAN anything?” Well, yes and no. Are they wholly encompassing of every aspect of people who vote differently than I do? No, of course not. Are they useful for progressives and conservatives to identify each other without having to do a full litany of beliefs of Judaic genealogical proportions? Yes, absolutely.
It’s come to my attention that some people, usually progressives, don’t care to be “lumped into one of two groups”. To them I say, “Tough nuggies.” The binary nature of the groups comes from the binary nature of yes/no questions; among them: Does society need fixing? Can it be done? Do you know how to do it? Etc… A majority of the digit Yes as answer puts one in a progressive camp, and No in the conservative.
In the same manner: how could you ask me that question without use of the nom de guerre, “enemies of the right”? Does “right” mean anything? Is it useful? Of course! You knew I would know what you were asking. By all the rules and reasons for language, I call that a success.
Huh-huh-huh! You said ‘bosom’. Gneh! Gneh! Bosom!
*And they know that if anyone still bothered to read them.
“It’s come to my attention that some people, usually progressives, don’t care to be “lumped into one of two groups”. To them I say, “Tough nuggies.” ”
Ben, please write a book.
I don’t think anyone sees you as unenlightened, Hotdog, although your obvious enjoyment of playing the “liberal bogeyman” role is noted with an appreciative smile. And you certainly keep me honest as an editor - I’m having to set aside chunks of what was previously veg-out-in-front-of-telly time to correspond in any meaningful manner.
You say that you’re the liberal, yet by your own admission, you’re the one wanting to confine people within one of two camps. You’re right, I don’t find it in any way a useful exercise - I suspect that you and I probably have as many beliefs in common as contrariwise, and that the whole “religion” thing is a simply a big distraction from that fact. And of course you’re correct, if I were to object to being called a “progressive”, then my sweeping generalisation of “the right” is no more valid, other than as a very blunt referencing tool. We’re both reasonably good at language - I think we can probably define our positions with a little more subtlety and sophistication.
For a recent example: I am the liberal because I refuse to regulate what people can say, or do. For a hot-button example: I think homosexuality is harmful to those who practice it, and to society at large, but I am not for regulating it. That shouldn’t negate my right to say that I believe it is bad and here are the reasons. I’d rather marriage were “reduced” in the eyes of government to a mere civil union (and with the advent of no-fault divorce I think we can call that: Mission Accomplished.) I don’t see what business it is of the government to say with whom I can or cannot form an economic partnership with; which is essentially what marriage is in the eyes of the government these days. Marriage is a religious occasion, period. I don’t need the government to vet my religion.
That brings me to your comment about the distraction of religion–it sounds good, but it is simply not true. Christianity gave birth to the idea that all men not only should be free, but actually are. That birth is true both within the world at large, and within me. Taken at what I’ve seen, were I purely empirical, most people should be my servants. The three authors I mentioned above knew that, too, and that’s why all of them prescribed removing religion from society.
That doesn’t mean we can’t have pints–even over (shudder) Morrissey.
HtB:
I’m not going to try to lay out my entire thinking on religion or political affiliations here, but I did want to make touch on some things.
1. When I say “religious crazies,” I do not mean “all people who have religious beliefs.” I mean by “religious crazies” people like Ben Stein, whose pathetic and simplistic religious beliefs make him feel threatened by realities exposed by science. I fail to comprehend why such people are so happy to accept some aspects of human understanding, and will happily fit these into their religious beliefs, yet at the same time feel so threatened by other things, discovered using the same methods. I don’t understand, in particular, what’s the big crisis to do with taking the story of Adam and Eve as allegory, and thinking that the being responsible for creating humans might just as well have decided to do so via an evolutionary process. Back when I still believed in a God of sorts, I used to imagine universes being created at a sort of science fair for deities, at which bonus points were given for parsimony, and that the deity who designed our universe won for the elegance shown by the amount of complexity generated from such a small starting set of parts and rules for assembling these parts.
2. It is my estimation that the more extreme religious types cause the overwhelming majority of the problems, but that religious moderates are partly to blame as well, for not reining them in, or at least making clear how they disagree with them.
3. I agree that not all religious sects are the same in their lethal potentialities. I’m not so worried about Quaker suicide bombers, to borrow from Sam Harris. Nor am I worried about Buddhists invading other countries with the idea of killing all their men and forcibly converting the rest, to borrow from Ann Coulter. Nonetheless, I have little patience for anyone who makes decisions about life in the here and now based largely on things like the assumption of an afterlife, the unquestionable validity of some old book, or the belief that they’re getting direct messages from God. I am also hugely suspicious of anyone who seeks to impose his or her faith on me or the governing principles of my society. Sorry, but just claiming some Chosen status, without evidence, fails to convince me.
4. As for “progressives,” I’ll join with pretty much everyone else here and reject your claim that everything boils down to binary choices. I grant some things can be, but I view most issues, and the ways to address those issues, as a continuous line. As a matter of political reality, however, I will sometimes adopt a more extreme stance, partly as a place from which to negotiate, and partly because, in some cases, it is my view that the opposition is not interested in arrving at a final compromise, but instead, seeks to chip away steadily and unceasingly.
5. To your examples of what comprises a “progressive,” I will give you my take on them, and leave it to you to decide whether I am a progressive or not.
Progressives are the people that subscribe to the ideology that there is a perfect sort of man and society, that they are attainable, that they are attainable through secular means, and the best way to go about attaining them is through regulation of those two things. They have their beginnings in Plato’s “Republic”, and their crescendo in the works of Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche; which is the holy trinity of secularism.*
I don’t think humans or human societies are perfectible. I think the notion of both is worth keeping in mind as an ideal, to help maintain a sense of direction. I do think both individuals and societies could be better, and in the latter case, can be made better in many aspects. (Apart from education, I don’t think an individual can be made better.)
I would not say regulation is the best or only way to improve society; in fact, I often think it makes things worse. Examples of potentially good regulation: consumer, environmental, and safety protection; keeping the brakes on some of capitalism’s excesses, like monopolies and gaming markets; and helping the less fortunate. Examples of usually bad regulation: the “War on Drugs;” restrictions on consenting adults and their sexual activities; blue laws; micromanagement of research initiatives; most tax breaks designed to incentivize some particular behavior; and no-bid government contracts.
I do think secular means are the way to go, there being no other existing way. I would say that not all progressives share my view on this; e.g., environmentally-minded evangelical Christians or religious people who view it as part of their duties to care for the poor.
I don’t know a whole lot about Plato, Freud, or Nietzche. To the extent that I do, I have found things in the first and third to both agree and disagree with, and I think of Freud mostly as a pioneer in his field whose thinking has largely been shown to be incomplete or incorrect. It is probably also true to say that I operate less in accordance with any other individual’s philosophical treatises. Instead, I am largely an empiricist, and take bits and pieces of philosophy from a great many sources. Some of these match core beliefs common to most religions.
To your later questions:
Does society need fixing? Can it be done? Do you know how to do it?
I answer: (1) yes, (2) yes, in most cases, and (3) not always, but that’s no reason not to try if I think I have a pretty good idea. What are your answers? If the first one is “no,” I’d say you need to get out more, and see how the other half lives. I do not think you’re answer is “no” here, though, so I’d be interested to hear why you think society can’t be fixed and why we shouldn’t even try.
To your closing point, I agree that there are is something useful to being able to say whether someone is a conservative or a liberal, but I don’t think there is much use to ending with this categorization.
To your later comment: What you call “liberal” I would call “libertarian.” This may say something about the limited usefulness of such labels. At any rate, I am happy to hear that you do not think homosexuality should be regulated, but I wonder what about it you think is harmful.
To the length of this response: I think, if nothing else, that I’ve made the case that it’s not just a matter of answering yes/no questions.
Finally, I’d have a pint with you, too, but if Morrissey is to be present, I claim the privilege of earplugs.