**I received this book as a galley from the publisher for review purposes.

Hadley Freeman has created a wonderful guide to the films of the 1980s and their effects on the generation that not only grew up on them, but their continuing and lasting effects with the generations that followed. Ms. Freeman takes humorous, thoughtful, and philosophical looks at some of the movies that defined the decade: Dirty Dancing, The Princess Bride, Ghostbusters, Ferris Bueller (where the book derives its title from), and the greatness that is Eddie Murphy at his peak. Ms. Hadley explores these stories from a very realistic perspective, at times looking at some of the questionable moments that contain racism, sexism, and classism, with brutal honesty. The wonderful tone that is prevalent throughout however, is the joy that these movies not only brought to the author, but to so many of that generation. I laughed out loud in several places, was shocked by some of the truths she pointed out, and was brought back to a time when I myself wanted to grow up to be Andie or Sam or Sally or Baby. Kudos to such a well researched and personal account of the decade that was defined by the struggles that all teens go through.