17 responses for this post

1. Chips O'Toole on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 9:06 am

   For some reason, and I have no idea why, I always imagined John hughes to be an old guy. basically, I was imagining him to look something like John Houston, I think. I always thought it odd that this old guy makes teen movies, but then figured, why not?

2. Chuck on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 1:21 pm

   Simply astounding that between 1984 and 1989 Hughes wrote and directed:

   Sixteen Candles
   Breakfast Club
   Weird Science
   Ferris
   Planes Trains
   She’s Having a Baby
   Uncle Buck

   AND between ‘83 and ‘90 also wrote:

   Mr. Mom
   Vacation
   Pretty In Pink
   Some Kind of Wonderful
   Christmas Vacation
   The Great Outdoors
   Home Alone

   You can’t have that kind of creative output and then just quit it all - he must be doing SOMETHING!!

3. freakgirl on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 1:57 pm

   Maybe he just ran out of ideas.

   Let’s make a documentary!

4. GeekBoy on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 1:58 pm

   Well … he didn’t do nothing after 1990. He just did a string of so-so movies that aren’t nearly as memorable as the ones you listed.

   Here’s the list between 1991 and 1998 …

   Career Opportunities (writer)
   Dutch (writer)
   Curly Sue (writer/director)
   Only the Lonely (producer)
   Beethoven (writer)
   Home Alone 2 (writer)
   Dennis the Menace (writer)
   Baby’s Day Out (writer)
   Miracle on 34th Street (producer)
   101 Dalmatians (producer)
   Home Alone 3 (writer)
   Flubber (producer)
   Reach the Rock (writer)

   So he had ten years of awesome movies, then ten years of mediocre ones. Which explains well enough to me why he just left the business. I mean look at the common denominator with most of those later movies — it’s mostly kid stuff. He wrote a movie in 1988 called “She’s Having a Baby”. My guess is he had one himself around that time, and that child just completely changed his creative “mojo”.

5. Chuck on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 2:25 pm

   Not saying he did nothing after 90, just nothing good! He quit directing after Curly Sue in 91 and basically quit everything eight years after that. He had his sons in the mid and late 70s, so I don’t think that has anything to do with it.

   Something’s up, I tell you.

6. maddie on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 2:25 pm

   Wow, those movies in the eighties were my life! Probably those are what started the movie obsession for me. What an accomplishment to have made so many movies that are now such classics.

7. sandra on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 3:03 pm

   I don’t think he ever got over Molly Ringwald!

8. Lisa on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 3:07 pm

   This brings us to the inevitable discussion of SOUNDTRACKS. My fave is a toss up between Pretty in Pink (OMD, New Order, Furs) and She’s Having a Baby (Kate Bush, Everything But the Girl).

9. GeekBoy on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 3:31 pm

   Okay, so having a kid didn’t change his mojo. But something did. It happens to writers and rock stars all the time. You’re in a groove for a certain number of years, your voice is strong, you’re in tune with the times, and maybe even — as is the case with Hughes — actually helping to define the times you live in. Then you dry up. All of a sudden, you’re irrelevant, and you can’t quite capture that magic any more.

   I look at that list of 1991-98 movies, and that’s what I see. He turned 40 in 1990. Curly Sue tanked at the box office, and either the studios lost confidence in his ability to direct, or he lost confidence in himself, or both. He went back to writing, and focused mainly on flicks with kids (or dogs) in them for some reason — flicks that were essentially endless strings of pratfalls — which pretty much doomed him.

   What I’m curious about is why that happened. I can easily understand why he wouldn’t want to write about teenagers any more — there’s a point where you get too old for that, I guess, and can’t do it justice. But why not keep writing movies about adults? Or at least college-aged kids? Why go the exact opposite way? Did he have grandchildren by that time? Or did Home Alone do so well that the studios would only let him make kid flicks?

   Regardless, I guess my point is that, based on the 1991-98 movies, why is it really a mystery that he disappeared? Isn’t that the smart move? If you can’t go out on top, at least go out before they talk you into making Home Alone 8.

   And I agree Lisa — awesome soundtracks!!!

10. Chuck on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 4:12 pm

    I think we can speculate till the cows come home. But pulling a Salinger is a very deliberate thing to do and I’m not convinced it has anything to do with any of those things you mentioned, Mr. GB. I suppose they work as theories on this here blog, but until someone is able to speak to the man, it’ll remain a mystery to me. He’d already made the successful transition from teen flicks to adult fare with Planes Trains and SHAB. So I too am curious as to what happened.

    Hollywood is cruel, but you don’t become the voice of a generation and get the reigns yanked from you for one Curly Sue. Maybe the pace burned him out and he wanted to make easy money as a writer. Maybe he had a plan all along to retire at 50. But there’s something about completely retreating from the public eye that makes me wonder what really happened.

11. Chuck on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 4:27 pm

    Clarification - It’s not a mystery as to why he quit writing and directing feature films. As Terence Malick said - “there’s something to be said for not making movies.” - But why did he completely disappear?

    And I still say that someone that creative doesn’t just quite being creative. He’s doing something, even in secret… and I for one am very curious as to what that is.

12. GeekBoy on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 4:40 pm

    Chuck, what are you speculating in your head when you say “What Really Happened”? Because it seems to me that between us, we’ve come up with a dozen good non-mysterious reasons for why he might have dropped out. So do you think something less obvious was in play? A feud with a studio executive? Agoraphobia? Some horrible illness? Or is it just the not-knowing that’s frustrating you?

13. GeekBoy on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 4:51 pm

    (FYI, I posed my question before your clarification.)

14. Chuck on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 4:55 pm

    Exactly - it could be anything. The fact that he didn’t just quit making movies, but became a hermit is what makes it so interesting to me. No one would be as interested if he went to movie premieres or tried Broadway or gave interviews or wrote novels. There’s something about completely turning your back on something and retreating into silence that’s fascinating to me and yes - it makes me wonder if any number of odd scenarios might have taken place. And I’m also intrigued as to how he’s getting his creative rocks off - is he painting, writing a novel, does he have a cache of scripts that we’ll find our about after he dies? I have a gut feeling there’s a story in there that’s richer than “he lost his mojo and quit.”

    And as a creative person, I don’t see how he could have simply put the pen down forever. Even Syd Barrett continued to make music that he never released. Maybe one day we’ll find out. Or maybe he’ll do an interview and say “I lost my mojo and took up crosswords.”

15. freakgirl on Tuesday, March 25, 2008 at 6:22 pm

    Maybe John Hughes is hanging out somewhere with Michael Schoeffling, planning a surprise party for me.

16. sandra on Wednesday, March 26, 2008 at 12:10 am

    Or maybe he was inhaled by Judd Nelson’s nostrils. Both are pretty good possibilities. Sadly we may never know the truth.

17. Chips O'Toole on Wednesday, March 26, 2008 at 9:36 am

    I heard he became a spy or something. maybe it was witness protection, but I doubt that. my money’s on him being a covert ops guy.

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