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What is the most Gen X movie?
- Thread starter lazygecko
- Start date
E.T. is up there for me. White suburbanite kids playing D&D and having care-free-roam of the entire area on their bikes. Single, working mother having no idea the trouble her children are getting in to. Goonies too, sure, but E.T. really nails it. I never really thought about this vibe until Stranger Things brought me back to it.
They are a bit earlier in the 80s and I struggle with including them, but movies like Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Valley Girl also tie into that MTV culture that is associated with Gen X.
and since I brought up Valley Girl, the film Clueless fits in too, perhaps even more so considering it's mid 90s.
and since I brought up Valley Girl, the film Clueless fits in too, perhaps even more so considering it's mid 90s.
Lol. She was my first celebrity crush when I watched Gremlins as a wee kid. then I saw this movie......
A good obscure pick could be the 1979 film "Over the Edge", dealing with a younger version of Gen X than typically seen.
en.m.wikipedia.org
was also notably an influence on Kurt Cobain.
Over the Edge (film) - Wikipedia
was also notably an influence on Kurt Cobain.
Club Interviewer: Now, a song like "Touch Me, I'm Dick" is about... what?
It doesn`t get more 90s than that:
Cliff Poncier: Well, I think "Touch Me, I'm Dick," in essence, speaks for itself, you know. I think that, you know, that's basically what the song is, um... about... is about, you know... I-I think a lot of people might think it's actually about, you know, "My name is Dick, and, you know, you can touch me," but, I think, you know, it can be seen either way.
I'm not really sure if Almost Famous or Singles is Cameron Crowe's best film, but Singles is definitely underrated.
EDIT: Also...
That last one is probably the one I most relate to :/
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That and Doom Generation are ones that remind me most of my perception of the era.
Gonna add Beat Street to the thread
Dammit, nostalgic thinking of all these movie has got me feeling like watching Gleaming the Cube.
Swingers for me. As a young adult in the '90s I related to this movie the most, down to the cringy voice mails scene and playing NHL on Sega Genesis.
Mall Rats definitely captures that "lets hangout at the mall" aspect that was a slice of 50-90s America that is utterly gone now, along with the usual no cell phones, importance of driving cars, etc.
Clerks the angsty "my life is shit" feeling but I think every teenage generation has that.
Fight Club the "Its our turn to change the world" but again, most generations share that.
my pick imo would be Wall Street, it captures the "fuck everything, Greed is Good, lets make money and do anything we want" that Wolf of Wall Street recaptures for a later generation. also Trump is in Wall Streets sequel, lol
Clerks the angsty "my life is shit" feeling but I think every teenage generation has that.
Fight Club the "Its our turn to change the world" but again, most generations share that.
my pick imo would be Wall Street, it captures the "fuck everything, Greed is Good, lets make money and do anything we want" that Wolf of Wall Street recaptures for a later generation. also Trump is in Wall Streets sequel, lol
I always felt St. Elmo's Fire was more of a Boomer/GenX borderline flick. They were supposed to be 20-something college graduates in the 80s, while the other films were firmly high school movies in the Gen X range.
yes this movie is the perfect embodiment of my young adulthood - and bit more realistic than Clerks, which is more how I wanted to be. Also the gregg arraki movies have that edgy vibe but very far from reality - it's more of a fantasy.Ghost World
It also happens to be the best comic adaptation too.
Clerks and Slacker as well
Before Sunrise
and Slacker
Basically any movie by Linklater is a gen x film, because the most gen X thing you can possibly do is ramble, slightly stoned, some nonsense about the Man keeping you down and doing roughly nothing about it. Charming but naive
and Slacker
Basically any movie by Linklater is a gen x film, because the most gen X thing you can possibly do is ramble, slightly stoned, some nonsense about the Man keeping you down and doing roughly nothing about it. Charming but naive
Gen X encapsulates people born between 1965 and 1980. That 15 year spread makes it almost impossible to name a definitive Gen X movie. For those who were teens in the 1980s, it will be something like Breakfast Club or Heathers. For those who were teens in the 1990s, it will be something else.
Ooh, that one's an interesting example. One that demonstrates a severe cultural rift between Early Gen-X and Late Gen-X.Is it Wayne's World?
"Rock" youth culture of that type was huge in the 1980s, but it really was a holdover from the late boomer years of the 1970s. Youth were so desperate for their own identity, without knowing it, that when Nirvana and the whole grunge scene hit in the 1990s it obliterated the whole rock culture Wayne's World was built upon. This movie has similar qualities as Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure in its underlying culture in that the whole "party time! excellent!" theme became gauche shortly after release.
The way I see it, Gen X defining movies can fall anywhere between Star Wars in 1977 and American Pie in 1999. The first Star Wars was the first real cultural phenomenon for Gen X kids, and American Pie, while it borders on Millennials coming of age(the kids depicted in the film are born around 1980), is really the last original movie to feature the characterizations of Gen X teenagers set in the present time.
I don't know, the actual borders are so muddy.
This really captures something I've always felt about American Pie versus Harold & Kumar, but couldn't articulate as well as this. American Pie is capturing Gen-X teenagers/young adults on film.
Like the Harold & Kumar writers, I grew up in a Jersey town that felt equal parts Italian/Irish Catholic, Jewish, Asian, and Indian.
When I was 13-14 and watching a movie like American Pie, it felt like an wildly outdated "Old Person" belief of what high school and college in America was like. When Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle came out five years later, I loved the damn movie so much. H&K felt modern and relatable to me in a way that American Pie didn't, which instead felt like some 80s "nerds and jocks (and everyone's white) hijinx LOL" nonsense.
And yet despite all that it has aged quite well and had a big cultural impact.
All very interesting. Gen X would encompass teenage hippies to yuppies all the way up to grunge (for the late Gen-Xers). Definitely a difficult, if not impossible, question.
I'd almost roll with something 90s simply because the letter X is found in the word EXTREME! So Clerks. (That's how it works, right?)
Oh ya, everyone loved the movie. Its sequel didn't make as much of a splash, but it was still widely enjoyed too.
I think for young gen-x's, like born late 70s, Reality Bites or Clueless are both in there. Like if you were a 16 year old when Clueless came out, that movie was like peak high school experience.
Similar with Millennials I think you need to break it down because it's a big generation:
Old Gen X (Late 40s to early 50s): Breakfast Club or St. Elmo's Fire
Middle Gen X (mid to later 40s): Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Young Gen X (early 40s today): Reality BItes or Clueless
If St. Elmos Fire was your "peak high school movie" I think you'd have a hard time identifying with Clueless or Reality Bites. And likewise, if Clueless was your "peak high school movie" then you'd probably think of Breakfast Club as, like, a movie you liked when you were in 5th or 6th grade on cable reruns TBS, or rainy Saturday afternoon on UPN.
Ferris Bueller's Day Off seems to bridge the generation. Old Gen X'ers probably still like it because it just seems a little more grown up than Breakfast Club or Sixteen Candles. Young Gen X'ers think of it as a classic.
Another I might throw out there that hasn't gotten mentioned is Adventures in Babysitting. Again I think this probably resonates more with young gen'xers... Like someone who would have been 10 or 11 when the movie came out or came on VHS.
Similar with Millennials I think you need to break it down because it's a big generation:
Old Gen X (Late 40s to early 50s): Breakfast Club or St. Elmo's Fire
Middle Gen X (mid to later 40s): Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Young Gen X (early 40s today): Reality BItes or Clueless
If St. Elmos Fire was your "peak high school movie" I think you'd have a hard time identifying with Clueless or Reality Bites. And likewise, if Clueless was your "peak high school movie" then you'd probably think of Breakfast Club as, like, a movie you liked when you were in 5th or 6th grade on cable reruns TBS, or rainy Saturday afternoon on UPN.
Ferris Bueller's Day Off seems to bridge the generation. Old Gen X'ers probably still like it because it just seems a little more grown up than Breakfast Club or Sixteen Candles. Young Gen X'ers think of it as a classic.
Another I might throw out there that hasn't gotten mentioned is Adventures in Babysitting. Again I think this probably resonates more with young gen'xers... Like someone who would have been 10 or 11 when the movie came out or came on VHS.
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Empire Records for me 100%.
It's got plaid. It's got chokers. It's got apathetic teens. It's got an evil record exec corporate slimeball.
It's everything Gen X loves!
It's got plaid. It's got chokers. It's got apathetic teens. It's got an evil record exec corporate slimeball.
It's everything Gen X loves!
Ferris Bueller only came out a year after Breakfast Club and St. Elmo's Fire.
Lol.
Rich. Virtual outfit/fashion selector. Hook up with older step-bro.
Yup, totally checks out!
I'm a Millennial and fight club was a huge movie for my generation. Plus it came ou in '99. I don't think it's "Gen-X" at all.