That was one of the many things about this movie that bugged me. It's not like she's living in some trailer park, she's living in a nice little house, albeit a tiny bit run down but not that bad. And come on, she even has a car, but oh no she's poor because -gasp- it has a DENT in it. It seems to me like Andie was just a brat, she had a fine life, she just always wanted more.
I guess in this movie if you don't live in a mansion, you're poor. Weird logic.
She also had her own phone,with its own answering machine and had her own sewing machine (those things are expensive!)
I guess if you didnt own a BMW in the 80s you really were poor.
She had a job; having her own phone was not such a big deal, the additional line only cost a few dollars a month. The Karmen Ghia is a much older car; she probably bought it used for a couple of hundred - or it could have been a hand-me down from a family member. Besides, wealth is relative; if the districting for her school put a couple of blocks of middle, middle class in the same school as a bunch of top ten percenters - yeah, they are going to feel poverty level.
shareWealth isn't relative, only brats who should be thankful think it is. Go to Africa or the slums of a third world country to see what poor means.
shareThis was one of the major things that annoyed me about the film. Andie wasn't a bare foot, living in a shack poor person. Although the film treated her living situation as if that were the case and she certainly thought she was poor.
In my opinion she was comfortably middle class or maybe lower middle class. The house she lived in was decent and presentable. But of course if she kept comparing it to Steff's house then that is the origin of Andie's real problem.
But the deepest problem I had with Andie's living situation was how little compassion she had for her father. He was obviously suffering from a severe depressive disorder (probably the reason he lost his wife) and Andie treats it as if he just jumped out of bed and smiled it would cure him.
Like Spader, Harry Dean Stanton put too much effort into his cameo character and the script wasn't equal to it.
If you have no money coming in you're poor! Whe don't know if she rented or owned the house?
"Her" car may have been registed to her dad? She may have been on SS due to her mother's death/absence or whatever?
There were quite a few unanswered questions but it's likely the household was very cash-poor even if they could make the rent/utilities/food probably due to gov. assistance. Maybe two people living on just about nothing could make it?
The film didn't touch upon the aspects of Andie's living situation. We don't know what they were surviving on.
The mother left the marriage and abandoned her child. But as far as I know, that is not a valid reason for the state to be giving SS. We also don't know how long the mother left. It seemed to be pretty recent.
All we have to go on is Andie stating that she is poor. But it doesn't look that way in the film.
I mean, heck if I compared my house to Steff's house, than I could tell the world I was poor too.
Well, in my hometown in the suburbs of Boston there were few indigent people, but plenty of families, like mine, lived in apartment complexes and tiny ranch houses. My mother's job as a beautician and my dad's intermittent child support let us live okay month to month, but anything I had, clothes, stereo, record collection, concert tickets, and heck, even a lot of my own food came from my job at a grocery store. We were working poor, like Andie and her dad.
Now, ringing the tracts going out of town was street upon lane of McMansions where preppies and corporate families lived. If we wanted a car we had to spend all our after-school-job cash on payments and repairs. The rich kids' folks gave them Corvettes, Porsches, and 4X4s for their 16th birthdays. The rich kids had cliques and wild parties when their parents were out of town. It was kinda like a John Hughes movie that way.
The difference for me was attitutde. Andie looked longingly at the grand mansions. So would my girlfriend. I was growl back about the corporate kleptocrats who made bombs to kill brown children in foreign lands. I hated the sonsofbitches. I knew one thing by the middle of sophomore year: I wasn't going to be caught dead at the rich pigs' prom. I ain't gonna come tottering in in Mr. Tux so you a-holes can laugh at me again. Screw that. I'll go to Boston to see the F.U.'s!
I was a bubblegum Marxist.
That's what bugged me about Hughes. Rich guy to the rescue! 16C, PiP, Plains Trains and Automobiles. Oh lawdy, we sho' be grateful massa take us fo' ride in his big car!
He wouldn't have been able to work in Hollywood if his attitude wasn't menial enough.
It wasn't only Hughes, you can see the "rich people sure are something great" story in just about every film.
Actually, Hughes is NOT making the rich people look great, he is making them look shallow and superficial. He makes Blaine look like an exception to the rule. He does not make rich people look better than poor folks, in fact he does the opposite.
shareThe mother left 3 years before the movie started.
shareHi kaskait, I TOTALLY agree with you about Andie's seeming lack of compassion for her father. It makes this film difficult for me to watch, because her "tough love" is a little TOO tough. Her father is the nicest person ever, so much so that it moves me to tears! The way she "talked back" to him (after he missed the appointment) pained me, because he didn't deserve such vitriol. If I ever spoke that way to my dad - even now that I'm an adult - he'd put my butt in a sling. A million times more so if I had been Andie's age!
Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. -Edison
But the deepest problem I had with Andie's living situation was how little compassion she had for her father. He was obviously suffering from a severe depressive disorder (probably the reason he lost his wife) and Andie treats it as if he just jumped out of bed and smiled it would cure him.
The movie is set in the suburbs of Chicago,not L.A.
Whats with the name calling anyway?
Hah! That's funny of course I knew it wasn't SoCal or any part of the state for that matter but what was with that mini ChinaTown?
How may LA streets have train tracks within ten feet?
Children whose mothers are dead receive social security but I don't know about cases where desertion is involved?
I don't know, they seemed really poor to me. Just my opinion.
sharethe movie was supposed to be in chicago but almost all the locations were filmed in LA Andies house is in Pasadena "trax" filmed in santa monica the mansion she dreamed of living in is in LA street scene LA. the prom location set in LA. oh by the way there are train tracks in Los angles and in the rest of SoCal have you not been to san diego? the train track scene was filmed is Pasadena
shareI think it was in relation to the other kids she goes to school with. When she gets in trouble with the school the principle makes a remark about how she's lucky to be getting that education so I'm guessing she got into the school under special privileges or something.
I just felt in general the movies was too fast plot wise and background wise, they fall in love after one date, Duckie gets over her in about a week after thinking he wants to marry her, ect ect.
I mean I get it it's an 80's teen movie but I kept feeling jolted by everything personally.
Sure it was a nice little house and she was not living in total poverty, but everything is relative. She went to a high school that was divided between rich and poor kids. The rich kids drove BMWs, were members of the local country club, were abusive to the poor kids, could buy $800 prom dresses and did not have to worry about how they are going to pay for college.
Andy had to work after school, she had to get a scholarship for college and had to make her own prom dress. Sure she was not Slumdog or Beast of the Southern Wild poor, but she was poor relative to her environment.
Andy was not brat, in fact she is making the most of the bad hand life gave her. Her mother abandoned her, her father was depressed and refused to work. She never feels sorry for herself, she keeps moving forward.
agreed. she was a normal kid- no, better, she liked nice houses but she did make the most of what little she had and for the most part had a grateful attitude ("I'm getting a better education than I deserve")- unlike many people of any class, let alone kids.
why does everyone on this board seem to hate Andie and Blane so much? everyone here just dumps on them but loves Steff, the actual jerk of the movie.
http://tinyurl.com/b3pscuu Lol Kstew haters
Exactly! Andie made the most of her given hand and was likely going to go to college on an academic scholarship. She was not a brat at all like many people are accusing her of being. Steff was the spoiled brat who always got what he wanted.
Steff was the typical 80s movie *beep* He was a spoiled rich kid who was used to getting his way. When Andie turned him down he did not know how to deal with it, since daddy always bought him or gave him money to buy whatever he wanted.
Blane nails him at the end when he tells him Andie figured him out, and what bothered him the most was the deep down he know Andie's assessment of him was correct.
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I think Duckie, and especially Steff ,were far more interesting characters than blah, wishy washy Blaine, and Andie, who had her personality but quite often came off as too bitter, and self pitying.I think this may be why some people dont sympathize them as much as they are supposed too.
shareI think she was poor compared to the kids that went to her school. Sure she had a little house but her schoolmates all loved in massive homes and drove BMWs. Anyone that couldnt compare was no doubt a pauper in their eyes. I would imagine she most likely paid and kept up maintanance on her car from her part time job at Trax.
"What, you don't like rice? Tell me Michael, how could a billion Chinese people be wrong?"
"in total poverty"
I'd consider them lower middle class; not bad off at all. i envy her dad living in a time when one could "get by" not working.
also tuition was much more affordable in the 80s, a smart person could make it; and her record store is no walmart clearly.
geez i wish i had these people's problems.
Yes she was more middle class than anything else. She had a home, car and apparantly a lot of clothes/accessories. She had a job and her own money. People who live in their cars and don't know where their next meal will come from are poor. I feel sorry for them. I felt sorry for Andie because her Mother walked out on her and the Dad but that's it. She did not have it that rough just because she wasn't one of the upper 2% of society. Also she got picked on by Benny at school, who didn't really say anything that hurtful, but otherwise had a good social life with devoted friends and three different guys who wanted to be with her. A lot of teeange girls would kill for all she had.
share"Sixteen Candles" is the film set in Chicago- I'm not sure the location is ever identified here, but obviously Sol Angeles- I was living in Hollywood then-
You could still find an apartment- I moved back there again in'93- the Commodore across the parking lot was over 90 percent empty- all the windows were dark, and the manager tried to talk me over there after I helped jump start her car-
by the end of the 90's the building was full- you could hardly find a "for rent" sign anywhere- an earthquake later- and when the Kodak Center opened- the relatively low rents in the same place went through the roof
anyway- I think the point is not that Andie is dirt poor- it's about the relationship between the classes and incomes of those at school, and how they affect young people. It's a universal look at something, not a documentary about being poor. We can't even hear the stupid train on the tracks she lives by- the "wriong side of the tracks I guess", because the title song is playing
Personally I've found that trains have been a major disturbance at the last four places I've lived- for over ten years now. More likely to be a noisy auto traffic venue these days I think!
http://thehearpe.tripod.com/index.html
They don't call it the big eighties for nothing. Class shame was a huge problem in the eighties for kids growing up. Whether you grew up in a trailer park or a small house in a less than desirable neighborhood; not being rich or at least well off was a hard fact to come to terms with. I remember a lot of kids in school would call themselves "middle class" even though they were clearly poor.
I think the movie captures the issue of keeping up appearances in the eighties quite well. Andy is poor but she makes an effort to never look like she is. Her hair is always done, her make up is always perfect; she "accessorizes" with all the gaudy baubles to distract from the fact that her clothes aren't name brand.
I do agree, though, that the movie sort of glosses over what it meant to be poor in the eighties. Even nowadays owning a small house and not having to work for long stretches (Andy's dad) someone would be considered well off.
I was living about 10 miles north of Boston, similar to another poster. My town had two types: the working-class regulars and the rich ones. It was really like the movie because the difference was really obvious. I was just a regular Joe (still am, really) and you did grow to dislike the rich ones after a while because it always seemed like everything was just handed to them. Andie didn't exactly have it tough (and neither did I) as she had a car, phone, clothes, friends, a job and more pink than Liberace.
shareI think CathyCPA09 nailed it! Back in the 80's, at least according to the John Hughes teen world, you were poor if you weren't living at least on the level of the Grisswold's! Besides Andie having her own car and phone in her room, her dad is not some lower-class POS! He's a good man and sitting on the couch in his robe reading a book when she returns home from her date!
I grew up in the northwest part of Austin, Texas and it was very much like Southern California was then! If you didn't live in some 3,000 square foot or more home in the hills and instead a more modest suburban neighborhood in a home with square footage in the thousands, you didn't have much, even if you had your own car, a job, and lived in a neighborhood with a pool!
i'm a millennial from houston, and the poor whites and black and brown kids worked for the yuppies, who by and large treated them like dirt. talk about a recipe for bad race relations.
i don't resent people for having "easier" lives, but I do resent the impossible situation 90% of the people in this country are thrust into what with unaffordable rents, college tuitions; the pay too damn low.
supposedly i have an iq a couple sd's above average, and yet am unable to access better opportunities because was all but abandoned by my middle class parents. without sounding unnecessarily entitled, I'm a really poor fit for the jobs determined for me by my class, but the mechanism to change that isn't there. it's not that i want more money or a better lifestyle (tho wouldn't mind) but work which makes use of my talents instead of feeling every shift that i'm being slowly suffocated from tedium.
this movie is super weird tho, like isn't it more embarrasing to live in a huge mansion when so many have so little? imo the OC did a better job of exploring class differences.
The OC?
Well no, Pretty in Pink does not explore class differences very well. Like I said, it better explores the idea of keeping up appearances so people could avoid class shame that was so rampant in the eighties.
I will try to address the rest of your comment. The fact that we live in a hierarchical society guarantees that nobody will be able to live up to their full potential. I don't think this affects just above average intelligent people, but people who are both bright and motivated to help solve society's problems (like curing cancer, but they can't do that if they can't afford to go to college). Having high aptitude isn't everything, empathy and a desire to contribute to the common good are exceptional qualities to have these days. So is the ability to be humble and learn from one's mistakes.
>> Class shame was a huge problem in the eighties for kids growing up.
Exactly, if you weren't rich back then you had damn well better at least look like you were if you wanted to be accepted by the "cool" people. What may seem like a cool old retro car to us now was seen as a crappy old car to the kids who drove fancy cars because they could either afford them or their parents were willing to go into debt to look like they could.
I do not have attention deficit disor...Ooh, look at the bunny!