Ferris Bueller's Day Off is finally in the American Film Archives

 Finally an American Classic

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

Year released: June 11th 1986 Rating: PG-13

Genre: Comedy Type of film: Blockbuster Length: 103 min’s

Writer/Director: John Hughes Cinematographer: Tak Fujimoto 

Major Actors: Matthew Broderick, Alan Ruck, Mia Sara

Ferris Bueller's Day Off has finally made it way into the National Film Registry Archives, making it officially and American Classic. This is a great feet, for a movie that is classified as a modern film according to archiving standers. Every year at the end of the year the National Film Registry selects 25 movies to preserve and place in the archives; these movies are protected as American Classics. It is every rare for newer films to make the list normally the archives select older films for example for the 1950 and under, but this year for the first time in archive history seven newer films made the cut and Ferris Bueller's Day Off was one of them. So to extend congratulations to everyone who made this amazing film possible here is the Coffee Blow Ferris Bueller's Day Off film critique.

Plot Summery/Synopsis

Ferris Bueller may seems like your average American teenager, but when he decides to take a day off of from school is friends began to realize there is nothing average about Ferris. Ferris' best friend is a nerd by the name of Cameron Frye who always follows the rules, never does anything wrong, is a hypochondriac, and is scared of everything. Early one morning before school starts Ferris decides to call Cameron who is seemingly very sick in bed with cold that is killing him. Ferris tells Cameron about his plans to take the off or as it is known to Cameron as skipping school, and he wants Cameron and Cameron’s fathers prize Ferrari to join him. After finally convincing his friend to steal his father’s favorite car to go on a road trip around Chicago, Ferris decides the trip wouldn't be complete without his girlfriend Sloane Peterson. He devises a plan to sneak her out of school without being caught by Principal Ed Rooney who wants to catch Ferris is the act of skipping school so bad that it doesn't seem healthy. Ferris and Cameron manage to sneak Sloane out of school and set out on a world win adventure. As they start out on the tour de Chicago, back home Ferris sister Jeanie is being terrorized by his principal who she thinks is a burglar. She calls the police only to be asked if her bother is feeling better only to have to take matters into her own hands. Back in Chicago everything was going wonderfully for Ferris and his friends they were having a good time until Cameron goes into shock. There is a blank stare on his face as his eyes glaze over read, and Ferris and Sloane try different things to knock him out of shock. After a long time Cameron starts to talk, he wasn't in shock; he was meditating and taking what he called a deep look at himself from within. Cameron realizes what Ferris was secretly trying to get him to realize all along, that he needs to stop being scared and stand up for him. So when the miles on the Ferrari wont roll back Cameron decides not to let Ferris roll them back by hand because he wants to stand up for himself against his dad. He goes into a rant about how he is treated unfairly and hates that his own father treats the Ferrari better than he treats him. As he leans on the car thinking of his father’s faces has he stands up to him and tells him what he did, the car roll out of the show room and falls into the large cliff outside of Cameron house becoming totaled. After killing the car Cameron decides to take the complete fall for what happened even when Ferris says it was his fault entirely, and just when you think the movie is over the race begins. The epic Ferris Bueller's race home to be back in bed before his parents get home from work, when he arrives him however he finds himself confronted by a mangled principal Ed Rooney who is holding the key he needs to get back into his house. Jeanie rushes home and save manages to save Ferris as she opens the door to let him in pretends his she was looking for him and that he was sick, she falsely thank the principal for driving Ferris home from the hospital and principal Ed Rooney almost starts to cry. When Ferris goes inside the house she spitefully throws the principal wallet that he dropped on their kitchen floor after he broke in to the family guard dog. Ferris makes it to bed just in time for his parents to walk into his room to check on him, the principal ends up having to ride the school bus home and see a sign that says save Ferris on one of the kids note books. Back at Ferris house he walks out into the hallway and tells the views the movie is over and tells them all to go home.

The people be hound the camera

           Everyone knows that great movies don't make themselves; we all know it takes a lot of people to make a movie come to life. So let’s look at some of the main people who help make this movie what it has become today find out what role they play in the outcome of the movie.

 The Write/Director

John Hughes

             It took John Hughes less than a week to write the screen play for Ferris Bueller's Day off and three months to shoot the movie. The reason he had to do this was the studio knew that there was going to be a big protest and they would have to shut down while the protesting took place. John Hughes wanted to make this move so much that he stayed out long hours and some say he did really rest until the movie was done. Why? Well the movie is what he called his, "lover letter to the city." the city of Chicago, but it was so much more than that. His movie was a lesson for teenage youth the message that is so clear throughout the move it even inspired a famous quote that people still use to this day the quote is from the character Ferris himself, "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." John Hughes made this clear not only in famous quotes for the characters but also from the filming itself. It was the first teen movie to include Mise en Scene shots and implication shots. One implication/Mise en Scene shot in the movie is When Cameron was looking at a painting of a little girl and Hughes did montage shots mixed with close ups to show that there was a something in common between Cameron and the little girl in the painting. He wanted the viewer to learn life lessons and to learn about Chicago. He always gets criticized for shouting in Chicago and he as he pointed out another famous director, "doesn’t get criticized for shooting in New York all the time." He wanted to show the wonder of Chicago and all the things it was famous for, “I really wanted to capture as much of Chicago as I could. Not just in the architecture, and landscape, but the spirit." Hughes states.





Cinematographer

      

                   Tak Fujimoto seemed to share the same vision as Hughes his images incased every scene and captured some deep and enriching moments in the move. His shots themselves are artful and meaning and people use them to pictures and points, they are lessons in themselves. Which makes it so hard to believe that Tak Fujimoto actually got his start working on Ferris Bueller's Day Off was. That’s right Ferris Bueller's Day Off was Tak Fujimoto's first movie. His scene coloring and style shaped the depth of the movie. Just looking at his cinematography alone captures the mind and makes the viewer thinks. Tak Fujimoto uses color and symmetry to draw out these emotions not only in the audience but also in the characters. One of his shots is well known at the museum shot it shows the characters standing in front of a painting in line with their arms crossed. What someone don't notice or sometimes cut out of the shot when they turn it into a photo is the fourth man in the shot, who also has his arms crossed. His present not only makes the shot more symmetrical and eye pleasing but the color of his suite also rounds out the shot (http://collegefilmandmediastudies.com/cinematography/ collegefilmandmediastudies.com)The shot has a lot of light spectrum and a few medium spectrums, but it didn't really have a dark spectrum. When you take the man away the only items left to make up the dark spectrums are the strips in Ferris jacket and a small painting in the background. Some of his other famous shots are Cameron look outside at his father’s car from inside the showroom, the couch shot with Jeanie and the boy in the police station, and the fake moonlight scene in the museum.

Actors

    The main actors in the movie are Matthew Broderick who played Ferris Bueller, Alan Ruck who played Cameron Frye, and Mia Sara who played Sloane Peterson. Hughes said he had Matthew Broderick in mind while writing the script, he needed someone who looked young, charming, and innocence, yet manipulative. It might come as a surprise to some that Matthew was 24 when Ferris Bueller's Day Off was filmed, although he looks 17 at best in the movie. He's charm is one of the first things you notice in the movie, his presents in the film could have been seen as an immature teenager but his character came across more as the overly immature teenager who was trying to prepare his friend Cameron for the real world and life as an adult. Alan Ruck played Cameron and at the start of the movie his character seemed to be the mature one of the twos friends, but we soon came to realize that he was the average immature teenager, or maybe even overly immature teenager. Alan Ruck was 30 at the time of shooting and he was cast for the part as Cameron because he could come across as the neglected and alienated scare of his own shadow teenager, and play the role and a strong and fearless character. Some say he could have been cast as Ferris which at the end of the movie his character does break out of his shell and start to act more like Ferris. So Alan's rule in the movie is critical his personality needed to clash with Matthew's rule, they needed to be complete opposites yet still have a reason or something in common that makes then friends. Cameron’s inner Ferris like personality traits seemed to be that reason. At the same time Ferris also had some inner personality traits that match Cameron’s outer traits. Toward the end of the movie it was clear that what we thought in the beginning of the movie wasn’t true. Ferris wasn't the careless teenager, who only thought about himself, but he was more like Cameron, and Cameron wasn't the overly cautious, rule follower, but he was more like Ferris. Showing their friendship on screen wasn't too hard for the director to convey because they were best friends in real life, and that translated well onto the screen. In fact the casting was so good that some of the actors ended up becoming real couples and even getting married and almost married. Sloane was the only teenager on the set at the time of filming, and her character brings the out the adult side of Ferris and shows him as having a mature and adult relationship with her instead of a crazily passionate teenage relationship, it helps to show is grown up said, and in one scene on the movie when Ferris and Cameron are arguing about the cars odometer Mia and Matthew's character start acting like Cameron’s parents (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/11/ferris-bueller-_n_5461339.html Hiffinton Post). She is Matthew's characters support and Alan's characters nature, she tries to help Cameron recover from shock and in fights against Ferris, and she plays a parental role that balances out what could lead to a scene of teenage drama that could take over the movie she turns into a mature affair.

Why Ferris Bueller's Day off made the Nathional Film Registry

       It takes a long list of criteria for a film to get into the Library of congress, the film has to be meaning full an make a big impact on society. Ferris Bueller's Day Off wasn't just a teen movie, it intersted all age groups, but it also made a big statment and was historical as well. In was a amazing depection of 20th centry younth but also of Chicago. (http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2014/14-210.html library of congress) 

Oh (SNAP)! Food Stamp Problems.

Don't let the Food Stamp Problems Make You Snap.

               SNAP is the new and seemingly very accurate name for the government program formally known as Food Stamps in America. SNAP is the acronym for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. The name has been changed to try and change the public phobia of food stamps. The thought was that there were people who were in desperate need of government food assistance but wouldn't apply for it because food stamps had a bad name in the public eye. The name changed actually worked millions of people who never would think of signing up before flocked to sign up and received SNAP, but everything has two sides and SNAP is no exception. Of the millions of people who flocked to receive help in desperate times, many were turned away. Many of whom were left crying, feeling hopeless, and wondering why they were left to continue their suffering alone. They may not have known it then but I hope they know now that they were and are not alone and that some of them actually came out of the shadows and took to social media outlets to speak out against what happened to them. They turn to social media to try and find the answer to why, when the needed help the most they were turned away and left to starve. They ask questions like, "Who is in charge of deciding who needs help?" "Who decides who is poor?" "How do they know I don't need help" and "Who else has gotten rejected?"
       Well out of the 318.9 million people who live in America 45 million of them are said to be living within, on, or under the poverty line. For a lot of people this program can be every helpful, but for a lot of other people, this program can cause a lot of stress. Stress caused by the fact that they were denied the food stamps that they so desperately needed. Of the 45 million people living in poverty 46.2 million are part of the SNAP program. WHAT!? Yes, we all know basic math and these numbers are a little baffling because common math tells us that 46.2 million is 1.2 million more than 45 million. Where did these 1.2 million people come from and how out of a country of 318.9 million are only 45 million within the poverty line, and why are 46.2 million people on food stamps when 45 million are said to be on the poverty line. Are we to assume that all 45 million people who are on the poverty line are on food stamps and if so then why aren't the other 1.2 million extra SNAP members considered in poverty. Who are these people who get denied and why do others get help  while others are left crying because they have been denied food stamps? Is the food stamp system broken, or is there an enormous computing error that needs to be fixed, and what can you do if you are denied food stamps and have no money to buy food?
      First, let's look at the numbers. The census says that the average American income is 27,519 a year, but according to the Social Security office 40% of people are making less 20,000 a year before taxes. That is 10% away from being half of America's population. After taxes, that amount is 17,459.55 and they didn't include the deduction for health insurance or pensions in the after-tax amount. This means that 191.34 million people in America are living within the government's idea of the poverty level. With these new number, we can see that of the 191.34 million people living within the Americans poverty levels only 46.2 million are receiving SNAP, that leaves 145.14 people who need to be on SNAP without food. Now the SNAP website says that 50% of people who need to be on the SNAP program never try to receive food stamps so let's remove them from our new list of 145.14, 50% minus 145.14 equals 72.57 million. So if the government site is right that means that 72.57 million people who are below the poverty levels have applied for food stamps and we can only assume because of the 46.2 million that are receiving food stamps that these 72.57 million who applied were denied food stamps. The numbers clearly didn't add up but after seeing some clear cut numbers lets see what may have happened to the 72.57 to make them unable to receive food stamps.

       Food stamp requirements. The chart below serves two purposes it shows what the poverty levels are considered in this country and it also shows the income levels that are excepted to receive food stamps. http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/14poverty.cfm. Here we can see the different levels of income that are considered for food stamps. Since the government is going to take away 1 million food benefits from single people in 2016 I am going to assume that 1 million of the people denied food stamps are single people with no children making at least 1 dollar more than 11,670. These 1 million people sometimes have time constraints on how long they can receive food stamps for which is mostly only 3 months. Now we are at 71.57, and yes that it right I have read stories about people who have been denied food stamps for making a dollar over, 20 dollars over, and 50 dollars over the cutoff income for their household. This can also happen if the person applying for food stamps is poor and decides to live with a family member so that they don't have to be homeless on the streets. The person they are living with has to be on their food stamp application as well as their income even if they are not applying for food stamps, and their income can keep that person who needs food stamps from getting them, even if they only get paid 20 dollars a month.
          At the end of 2013 and the beginning of 2014, there were budget cuts to the SNAP program that lead to the denial of food stamps to 4 million people and 71.52 minus 4 is 67.52.  Let's imagine for a minute a single mother with two children who works long hours, or two or three jobs to keep a roof over her child's head, provide clean water for them to drink, and a babysitter to watch her child when she works. We all know someone like this, it's not an uncommon story. She has to make 19,790 a year to receive food stamps, but there is a problem she makes 20,190 (darn that court order 400 a month child support) because of child support she can't get food stamps. With her apartment rent (heaven help her if she has a house), electric bill, water bill, heating and air bill, child care bill, car note, car insurance, and some apartment make you get renters insurance, gas money, clothing for the children and hopefully herself, doctor bills, life insurance, health insurer, dental insurance and lets stop her because she is already doing better than most single moms now what are missing? Money for food is missing, and with all those bills even child support won't help her pay for food. If there are three people the law says you have to have at least a two bedroom apartment, and after a certain age if one of your children is a boy and the other is a girl you have to have a three bedroom apartment and those are every pricey. Let's not forget single dads who have just now started to be able to apply for food stamps without the help of women. Yes men use to not be able to sign up for food stamps, but don't worry they can sign up now (GO Single dads! Thank you guys for paving the way for other men to help better their lives and if they have them their children's lives as well)
     Another factor that can play a big role on if someone can get SNAP or not is assets. Assets seem to play a big role in who gets food stamps and who gets denied the government made new standers for how much a person or family can have in assets to receive food stamps. If someone were to have too many assets they are denied food stamps even if it was just a car they bought before they lost that really nice job they had. Assets caused 31,194 million people to be denied SNAP once again 67.52 minus 31,194 is 35,806.52 . These limits can be anywhere for 1,000 to 25,000 and higher one of the rules on the government site says the person has to have at least three months worth of living expenses in their assets to be denied for SNAP. This varies from state to state so that would explain the 1,000 to 25,000 range. I can't find number for the other reason people get denied food stamps but some of the other reason would be convicted of a violent crime, in some states drug use (but very few), if there is unclaimed unemployment, and having too much money in your bank account this falls with the 3 month living expenses rule.
       So what do you do if you are one of the 72.57 million people that have been denied or haven't signed up for SNAP? Hope is not lost, and you are not alone. Help is out there from places like Suncap to Angel Menesery sometimes help can be found in the most unexpected places, and while SNAP is a big name like Target and Walmart there are other smaller companies out there that may even be able to help you more the SNAP, because we all know how the famous saying goes "food stamps don't buy diapers."