Ferris Bueller's Day Off: How To Live Without Regrets

Ferris Bueller’s day off is one of my favourite films of all time - it’s about how to live fully, without apology or fear, and it communicates a message about life most people realise far too late in life, often on their deathbed. But, more on that later. 

If you’re watching this video but haven’t seen the movie, don’t worry,  it’s not really a film that you can spoil - the plot is pretty straightforward; 

The movie is about a high school student named Ferris Bueller, who skips school with his best friend and girlfriend, and the adventure they have on that day. THE END

This film embodies the old cliché of the journey being more important than the destination. Ferris Bueller’s day off is a modern day fairy-tale, and it carries with it a much deeper lesson on life. It’s that lesson which had a profound effect on me, and it’s a lesson which I feel, has only become more relevant, and more important, since the film was made. 

It was released in theatres back in 1986, and it’s aged like fine wine, a true classic. It’s technically a comedy, but it’s not so much laugh-out-loud funny like modern day comedies. It’s just pure fun. Perhaps due to things like Netflix and attention metrics and so on, modern comedies have to hold increasingly shorter attention spans, and do this by having a joke every 5 seconds like some supercut fuckin YouTube hrnng. 

Ferris Bueller has a different promise - this is a film which early on will slap a grin on your face, and keep it there for the whole 103 minutes. It feels like we’re no longer in an era where these sorts of feel-good movies can be made. Perhaps it’s because we’re in a more cynical time - audiences aren’t as receptive to it. 

Which might be why this film has aged so well. It’s bursting with optimism. It’s my go-to feel-good film, and it’s been a source of comfort as the years have gone by. 

It’s also, as a story, quite unusual.

You see, in the majority stories, be it novels, films, TV, there’s generally a central character. And part of what makes that story compelling, usually, is watching this main character change over the course of the story. It’s as much about where they go and what they do as it is how much it affects them. [footage from other films] This, my friends, is a character arc.

The story, in a sense, documents the main character finding the answer to a question. A triumph is marked by them finding the right answer, and a tragedy is when they find the wrong one. They begin the story with one world view, and end it with that view changed.

Yeah Ferris Bueller’s day off doesn’t fucking have that

At the start of the film, Ferris Bueller has the following philosophy:

Life moves pretty fast - if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

And at the end his philosophy is unchanged:

So what gives? This film has a simple plot and the main character doesn’t change? Why is this film so good? 

WELL IMMA TELL YOU

The opening scene of the film has us watching Ferris pretend to be ill, convincing his parents that he is in no condition to go to school. His parents are easily deceived, although his sister knows he’s faking. Ferris doesn’t try to hide the fact that he knows she knows. The ruse is successful, the parents and sister leave, leaving Ferris alone. And then Ferris turns, looks at the camera, and says;

They Bought it

This fourth wall break is so legendary that it’s been parodied to death in the years since. In this story, Ferris knows that this is a movie. He knows we’re watching, and he’s taking us along for the day, dispensing his wisdom in the process fake sick day.

But he doesn’t want to spend his day alone. He needs to rope in his best friend Cameron. Cameron is a stressed out, neurotic, depressed, anxious, overworked, underappreciated and under loved person. Cameron is me, Cameron is you.

GOD DAMNIT

Do you break the rules? You know what I mean, were you a troublesome kid in school? Did you ever skip school altogether? You probably knew someone who did. Maybe you were that person at one point or another, but it’s more than likely you went through the motions and did what you were told. Sure you occasionally got in trouble, but as time went on you just got on with it more and more. Day in and day out you went to school. And eventually school turned to work. Day in, day out. 

A lot of us fear the repercussions of what would happen were we to step out of line - it’s the fear of detention, or being fired, of the teacher, or the parent. It’s the fear of authority.  It looms over us. And perhaps rightly so - it’s not irrational. Most of the time, we do need a job, we do need to go to school. But it doesn’t dominate our lives.

For Cameron, it does. He perpetually lives in this fear, his life is defined by it. Cameron’s main fear is of his strict father. As Ferris explains: Diamond, museum. If he keeps living like this, always living in fear, he’ll never be happy. Cameron is, in a sense, the main character of this film. He is the one with the biggest character arc of the whole movie - he has a fear to conquer.

So how do you conquer this fear? Ferris has the answer, and he shows it to Cameron, and us, throughout the film. The solution is simple - you laugh at the fear. You tap-dance and cosy up to it. You evade it. You make out in front of it. When it seems like you should just give in, and that all hope is lost, you don’t. You push through and laugh the entire way. Ferris and the gang run into trouble at every turn, and time and time and again they’re ok.

The film doesn’t undermine the fear of authority. If anything, it makes it worse. In the film, while we never see Cameron’s parents - which is interesting in itself - we do see the principal of Ferris’ school - Ed Rooney. He serves as the main villain of the story, and he is hell-bent on catching Ferris and his friends red handed. He spends most of the movie skipping his job just to chase Ferris and track him down. The idea that a principal would go so far out of his way to catch a single student skipping school is the exact sort of thing that a paranoid person like Cameron would fear, but Ferris doesn’t care. It doesn’t phase him. If anything, he revels in it.

Almost everyone in the film already knows Ferris. His reputation isn’t that he’s controversial or feared, but rather, that he’s universally loved - he’s a righteous dude/guys at the force are rooting for him. Besides the principal, there’s one other character who doesn’t feel this way. His sister, Jeanie. 

Do you know someone like Ferris? Someone who floats through life without a care, with seemingly everything they touch turning to gold. Do you resent this? The fact that you have to work so hard and you’ve done all the right things, and yet the rules do not seem to apply to this person? Well, you’re in this movie too. You’re Jeanie.

You could watch this film and view Ferris as an awful person. After all, objectively he lies to almost everyone he meets, he pressures his best friend to take a risk, and generally causes chaos - but I think the reason he gets away with it - and why so many love him, is because he does all this mischief with good intent. Anyone who has watched this movie and dislikes Ferris, I can’t help but feel they’re jealous in some way - perhaps of how free he is.

And Jeanie goes through her own character arc - related to this - which is central to the movie. She too wants to catch Ferris, and tries to get her parents to see through his deception, to no avail. Much like the principal, all she meets in her quest to stop her brother’s plans is misfortune. She ends up in the police station, next to a dashing youn-- WAIT IS THAT A YOUNG CHARLIE SHEEN.

It is in this moment that Jeanie comes to realise her mistakes, as Charlie Sheen wisely tells her TIGER BLOOD YEAH MORE POWER AND

But no really he just says

Your problem is you.

Excuse me?

You ought to spend a little more time worrying about yourself, and less time worrying about your little brother. That’s just an opinion

And she does, and things get better.

Towards the end of the film, the consequences of the day do catch up to the Ferris and the gang. Cameron’s father’s prized possession is a restored Ferrari, which is what the team used during their day off to drive around in. The mileage on the car has shot up from what it was, not only because of their driving but because of some mischievous side characters. This means that when Cameron’s father returns he will find out that Cameron stole the car. Cameron is in deep trouble. 

Ferris and the gang try and reverse the mileage by driving it backwards, but their attempts come with some unwanted side effects …. *car being destroyed*.

And it’s in this moment - when Cameron is so utterly screwed, that he is freed. The worst thing that could have possibly happened, has finally happened. He’s destroyed his father’s most prized possession. But he laughs at it. Sure he’s scared, but he’s decided he’s going to deal with it. He’s tired of living in fear. 

At the beginning of the movie, it seems like Ferris has planned this entire day off just for fun. Really, it’s for everyone else. It’s for Cameron to show him what life’s about *you had this whole thing planned out didn’t you* It’s for his girlfriend Sloane so that he can propose to her. And, ultimately, it’s for us. Unlike most films where the main character changes by the end, in this film, it’s the rest of the world that is  changed because of the main character. Ferris doesn’t have a character arc in this movie, because the world does - and by extension - we do. 

You might be thinking, this is unrealistic no-one could really live like Ferris Bueller. Sure, in the movie he’s an extreme - maybe even an ideal. No one could live life like that every day. But even the film acknowledges this - he’s not exactly going to wing it through life forever -  he’ll be a fry cook at venus. Besides, he’s only skipped school 9 times. Nine times… nine times…. Numbers go down. Not every day can be a day off. 

The truth is, most of us are not like Ferris Bueller. We are not hyper-confident, super fun and daring. Most of us are instead much closer to Cameron. And maybe, for the most part, that’s for the best. But the Ferris Buellers of our world are important - they remind us that life is happening right now. That most of what we do, and what we’re scared of, is just bullshit. Should you skip work if you’re a doctor, or heart surgeon - probably not. But for a lot of us, we are not essential workers, and we all know it. And hell, the characters in this film are still in school! Remember school? Remember how important certain things seemed at the time that you laugh at now? Could that maybe be true of anything in your life today?

So how did Ferris Bueller change my life? 

Aside from reminding me to have fun, put things in perspective, and act as a source of comfort, it did affect me more directly. Many years ago, I had my own Ferris Bueller’s day off. It was at a time where I was feeling trapped, unhappy and depressed in a big corporate machine - I was in full-on Cameron mode. I spent the day with a girlfriend, and though I can’t say I crashed any parades, it was a great day. Who knows, maybe we went around some museums, ate great food  , fucked in the middle of the afternoon, or all of the above. And honestly, as trivial as it may have been, I carry that day with me now, years later. I knew from that moment on that I could break the rules and get away with it. Who knows, maybe I’ll do it again someday. 

We all need a bit of Ferris Bueller in our lives. A willingness to say screw it, and take back the day, to stop everything and look around, see the sights, smell the roses. And, yes, the next day we’ll have to go back. Back to our obligations, our work, our busyness. But we’ll be better for it, changed, like Cameron was. The act of a momentary escape gives you courage you can carry with you forever. No longer are we there as a prisoner of our fears. We can walk out whenever we like, if even for a brief moment. And in doing this, hell, we might return even better able to appreciate what we have already.

There’s a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying written by Bronnie Ware. She worked as a palliative care nurse, and was with many people during the final weeks of their lives. The movie so perfectly aligns with the message of this book. The top 5 regrets that people commonly said, are as follows: 

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

Ferris Bueller’s day off is a wake up call. A reminder that life is happening right now. You might nod along and think to yourself yeah, I know this, time is short, yadayada. But knowing a truth is not enough - it's not the same as internalising a truth. We all know the answers to the problems we have on some level, but we need to live them. If just for a day, or a moment.

So don’t just watch this video, if you haven’t seen it, go watch this movie. Let the message sit with you. And go live life. Because, after all:

Life moves pretty fast…..