Movies, football games, dances, and time with friends are the most memorable parts of high school. So, we asked Wylie High School students, “What are the best movies set in high school?” Most of the nominated movies are all from the 80’s, 90’s, and early 2000’s, and they are staples in teen lives across the U.S.
The Breakfast Club is about Five high schoolers from different cliques being forced into detention together. As the movie goes on, the characters share their reason for being in detention, and they ultimately end up becoming friends. This movie definitely highlights some stereotypical high school students and satirizes the formation of cliques and social disconnect within high school.
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is about a high school senior named Ferris Bueller. Ferris skips school one day, pretending to be sick, and he and his friends end up spending the day exploring Chicago.
Grease is set in 1958 where high school “greaser” Danny Zuko meets the sweet new transfer student Sandy, and they have a short summer romance. Sandy ends up not going back to her home in Australia and coincidently ends up going to Danny’s school. Danny ends up trying relentlessly to keep up his cool image, but he can’t help but be extra kind around Sandy.
Dead Poet’s Society is another amazing movie set in the late 1950’s. It takes place at the fictional boys’ school called Welton. The boys get a new English teacher who teaches them about life as well as literature. He teaches them of the importance of poetry and how you should always seize the day.
Napoleon Dynamite is quite a staple in high school movies as well. It shows the high school experience of Napoleon who is already a socially awkward outcast. After his grandmother is wounded in a car accident, Napoleon’s weird uncle shows up to help raise him. Napoleon becomes great friends with Pedro, who is set on winning class president. Pedro will eventually win the class election all thanks to Napoleon’s dance skills.
And now we enter the Rom-coms:
One of the most notable high school movies ever, whether you’ve watched it or not, is Mean Girls. Former homeschooled kid, Cady Herron, enters high school for her junior year. Almost instantaneously Cady is spotted by the plastics (the most popular girls in school), and she is absorbed into their group. Cady is transformed into the ring leader of the group and develops a crush on Aaron Samuels, who is one of the plastics’ ex-boyfriends. Cady has to wrestle with what’s right versus what’s easy and eventually learns how to coast through high school minus all the drama.
High School Musical 1 and 2 are some of the other nominees. High School Musical is based on star basketball player, Troy Bolton, and transfer student, Gabriella Montez, who meet each other and decide to audition for their spring musical together. They have to shake the status quo and are consistently challenged by their friends to leave things the way they were. In the second movie, the status quo has officially been broken, and everyone can be whatever they want. The students of East High School all get summer jobs at the country club where Sharpay Evans, once again, tries to ruin everything.
Sixteen Candles is about Samantha’s biggest birthday, her sweet 16. Sadly, she is completely overshadowed by her older sister’s wedding and her entire family forgets about her birthday, not to mention her crush is practically unattainable. Sam has quite the day and to top it all off, she’s getting hit on by a freshman! Samantha is miserable, but things turn around when her crush finds a note meant for her best friend.
Portrayed by the same actor as Samantha in Sixteen Candles, Andie is another social outcast at her high school in Chicago. Pretty in Pink is another John Hughes classic about Andie who’s only real friend is her much older boss who owns the record store where Andie works. As Andie already has her quirky friend Duckie that secretly has a crush on her, one of the most popular boys in school asks Andie on a date. Andie and Blane begin to date, but they both soon realize that mixing social classes is not as easy as they’d hoped.
And here comes that familiar feeling of being Clueless. Cher is going through high school as the popular girl who’s about the definition of a dumb blonde. She goes through school arguing her way into better grades and playing matchmaker rather unsuccessfully. She then goes on to fail her drivers test and ends up trying to date a boy that has far different interests than her. Cher gets to a point where she’s feels helpless and really just clueless.
Here’s a classic: 10 Things I Hate About You is about the romantic escapades of Cameron. He tries very hard to date the beautiful Sophomore Bianca Stratford, but her father has forbidden her from dating under one condition- her sister has to get a date too. Now for most people that would be no problem, but Kat Stratford is a “particularly hideous breed of loser.” She’s mean and brutally honest as well as very unfashionable. Kat has many other things on her mind, so Cameron and his buddies work together to get Kat a date to the prom. Things go sideways more than once but ultimately there’s a happy ending.
This one’s definitely a little cheesy, it’s a Cinderella Story. High school outcast Sam has been in constant torment by her stepmother ever since her father died. Sam works really hard to earn enough money to get into her dream school, only to be teased and treated terribly by her more popular classmates. To top it all off, she’s banned from going to the prom by her stepmother, and she may never get to meet her secret email pen-pal. Sam, with the help of her coworkers, is able to sneak out to the prom and finally meet her dream guy.
These are some of the greatest movies about high school ever. The votes have proved it, and it is the consensus of everyone on the Paw Print that these movies in particular should be a graduation requirement for all students.
