1980s

Accurately reflecting teenage experience in film is no mean feat, and there aren’t many filmmakers to achieve it like John Hughes. Born in Michigan in 1950, Hughes described himself as a “quiet kid” who loved The Beatles. Aged 12, he and his family moved to the Chicago suburb Northbrook in Illinois.

Entering the world of an Agnès Varda film requires coming to terms with who she is as a filmmaker. She understood and explored the ways in which documentary and fiction are inextricably linked while generally eschewing linear narratives, working instead to show her own complex relationship with her films as she made them. Films like Jane B.

John Hughes had the innate ability of tapping into the voice of a generation unlike any other director I’ve seen. His movies continue to make a lasting impact on the film industry – and it’s easy to see why. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Breakfast Club, Pretty In Pink and a plethora of other “teen” films that redefined the genre, gave thousands of hearts and minds a voice – something coveted if you were an angsty teen growing up in the mid-eighties.