Whatever happened to good teen movies? Seriously.The kids these days don't know what they're missing!
It seems like all of the great coming of age, telling the story of one crazy night, learning about love and pyromania movies came out when I was a tween and teenager.
Reality Bites, Can't Hardly Wait, Heathers, 10 Things I Hate about You, Dazed and Confused, Empire Records, Clueless, Jawbreaker, The Craft, Slums of Beverly Hills... hey, even Blue Crush and Bring it On. Kids these days are missing out! (And I'm not even going to get into how I think they may have replaced coming of age rituals and elders in some parts of our society.)
It seems like movie-makers have grown with us. Now we have Juno and Judd Apatow mature comedies (Knocked Up is a favorite), atrocities like The Hangover and sleeper specials like Girl Next Door, Stealing Harvard and Orange County, but what is there for teenagers? (Sorry, but I refuse to consider the Twilight series as potential roomies with the above mentioned gems.)
I notice that the tween genre has skyrocketed. High School Musical, Elf, Ella Enchanted, Princess Diaries; have teenagers been lost in the marketing squeeze between tweens and adults?
Or have demographics and economics shifted so much that Hollywood isn't interested in creating and marketing to the YouTube generation?
I'm really asking for feedback on this one.
Heathers is one of the all time greats. I never get tired of watching it. The number of simply awesome quotes in there is staggering.
ReplyDeleteActually, it was catching some of "Heathers" while waiting in a salon this afternoon that spawned this post!
ReplyDeleteDo you have any suggestions for what films are playing these important roles in today's teenagers' lives?
I think it's a meaningful question as so many are raised with the morals, vocabulary and rationalization doled out by media models.
High School Musical is the only one that springs to mind!?! Maybe Twilight... Mean girls? To boldly jump to a conclusion having done little research on the matter... with such easy access to digital movies now maybe teens are skipping the teen flicks (or the few that are available as you suggest) and heading straight to adult movies now? Watching the same things as us... The Hangover, Bridesmaids etc.
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