Brats (2024) Let's now crank the clock back to June of 1985. New York Magazine publishes "Hollywood's Brat Pack", an article by freelance Journalist David Blum.
Blum hung out with a group of young actors who were making a name for themselves in successful movies targeted for teens....and frequently their films featured groups of them together in the same film......(the core group included Andrew McCarthy, Rob Lowe, Molly Ringwald, Judd Nelson, Emilio Estevez, Ally Sheedy, Demi Moore, and Anthony Michael Hall.....non Brat Packers, but sort of an auxiliary, included Tom Cruise, Timothy Hutton, Jon Cryer, Sean Penn and a few others....)
Young audiences loved both them and their movies, so big surprise, the kids became overnight sensations......and being kids with Hollywood suddenly at their feet, they enjoyed the hell out of their skyrocketing fame and fortune.
What they were too naive to realize - their chronicler Blum was as hungry for attention as they were. Seeking an eye-catching hook for his article, he labeled them the 'Brat Pack', a junior varsity version of Frank Sinatra and friends' notorious 'Rat Pack'.
In other words....... Entitled, hard-partying sybarites who cared less about their craft and more about havin' a blast and getting seated in all the exclusive clubs up peasants could never get anywhere near.
Depicted as spoiled, overpaid jerks, the Brat Packers distanced themselves from each other. And inevitably, since the public has a short attention span for such stuff, the negative publicity dissipated. The BPers went on with their careers, to varying degrees of success and failure....(just like every other actor).
But Andrew McCarthy, a more sensitive soul than the others, absorbed the article not only as a pivotal moment in the zeitgeist but a profound earth-changing event in his own world view.
Apparently, nobody was around to tell this guy to get over himself.......
So 39 years later, he has directed 'Brats' a documentary on the Brat Pack phenomenon and the article's effects on the actors involved.
The upshot? Andrew.....time to move on, buddy. Let it go. Stop obsessing and whining over the article that people either don't remember at all, or never heard of it, or did hear of it and don't give a **** about it.
Some of the BPers made themselves unavailable to McCarthy and we don't blame them. Who in God's name wants to hash over this crap again as if it's important.
McCarthy does conduct a few semi-interesting conversations with Estevez, Cryer, Rob Lowe and Lea Thompson and others, but it's clear they don't attach anywhere near the importance to the article that he does. Yawn.....
And when he does track down and confront David Blum himself, you start to realize the film is nothing but a therapy session for McCarthy over his lifelong umbrage about the article.
Blum possibly disappoints McCarthy by refusing to sound ashamed and apologetic about 'Hollywood's Brat Pack'. But McCarthy appears to have made the film as a form of self-therapy for himself and believe it or not, hugs it out with Blum.
Fans of the actors and era might take a passable interest in this look backward......but personally, given McCarthy's entire premise for making the film, we'd have awarded this a higher rating if he'd given in to his angst and punched David Blum......
......or at least throw a cream pie in his face. 2 stars (**).
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