It was 40 years ago today

Was "Starrville" green and white or maize and blue (though I'm open to the possibility that it's Columbus, Bloomington or Champagne)? Because I went to HS in one possible Starrville and college in the other (a decade later, but I do remember the mid/late 70s vibe and it's your description is accurate)

 

Oof. Hard to watch even 40-something years later. That "alpha" and "beta" dynamic is also fairly common. Similar vibe in Swingers (Mikey and Trent) and Sideways (Miles and whatever Thomas Haden Church's character's name was -- I don't remember, and I read the book too). Except those films didn't have the gut punch ending -- their character moved on to something better.

 

I saw where Andrew McCarthy gave a reading in Square Books in Oxford, Miss., the other day. He's become a pretty accomplished writer/author. I suspect most of the crowd there saw Pretty In Pink in the theater.

 

Alternate endings to Hughes movies - Samantha realizes boys are dumb and begins same sex relationship with her best friend. The geek is charged with date-rape.
Breakfast Club: Bender pulls a gun and kills them all. Or really, any of the five. Or we have that cathartic moment at the end and it happens on the following Monday by some random student.
Ferris Beueller: Cameron kills himself. (I mean really, it was the logical next step).