Metacritic Film

Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Starring Matthew Broderick, Alan Ruck, Mia Sara, Jeffrey Jones, Jennifer Grey, Cindy Pickett, Lyman Ward, and Charlie Sheen

MPAA RATING: PG-13

Paramount
Comedy
102 minutes | Color
USA
Released In Theaters June 11, 1986

Ferris Bueller. Larger than life. Blessed with a magical sense of serendipity. He's a model for all those who take themselves too seriously. A guy who knows the value of a day off. Ferris Bueller's Day Off chronicles the events in the day of a rather magical young man, Ferris (Broderick). One spring day, toward the end of his senior year, Ferris gives into an overwhelming urge to cut school and head for downtown Chicago with his girl (Sara) and his best friend (Ruck), to see the sights, experience a day of freedom and show that with a little ingenuity, a bit of courage and a red Ferrari, life at 17 can be a joy! (Paramount)

WRITTEN BY
John Hughes

DIRECTED BY
John Hughes

Overall Metascore

This is a weighted, normalized average of all individual scores given by critics, on a scale of 0 (worst) to 100 (best).

60 / 100

Critic Reviews

100	Time Ferris and his adventures represent a teen's dream of glory: to have, at one's fingertips, the technical skills to sabotage the adult world's machinery of oppression and, at the tip of one's tongue, the perfect squelch for grownups' moralistic blather. [23 June 1986]
89	Austin Chronicle When people think fondly of John Hughes, it's movies like Ferris Bueller that they're thinking of.
88	The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Staff (Not Credited) This is the funniest teen movie I've seen in eons.
80	Film Threat This is John Hughes' best teen film, and it's a call to arms to everyone in the world who doesn't want to follow society's lame-ass rules at the expense of living a cool life.
75	Chicago Sun-Times The film's heart is in the right place, and Ferris Bueller is slight, whimsical and sweet.
70	Newsweek It's basically a mindless paean to goofing off, with interludes of dubious seriousness. [16 June 1986]
60	The New York Times Nina Darnton In this film [Hughes] has created a character who is every teen-ager's fantasy, but in the process he has lost some of the authenticity of his other films - leaving several slow transitions or awkward moments.
50	Chicago Tribune That the film doesn't live up to our anticipation of a rolicking good time is only part of its disappointment. [11 June 1986]
40	Variety Staff (Not Credited) Paucity of invention here lays bare the total absence of plot or involving situations.
40	TV Guide Staff (Not Credited) The story and pacing of this offbeat comedy wear thin after the first 20 minutes.
40	Chicago Reader Dave Kehr The overriding impression is one of utter nihilism, as reflected in a world divided into bored, crassly materialistic teenagers on one side and doltish, unfeeling adults on the other.
0	Wall Street Journal One of the least appealing movies I've seen in a while.... When a member of the audience belched loudly, that got the biggest laugh of the day. [17 June 1986, p.26(E)]

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