Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me? Yeah, tell that to Andrew McCarthy. The fact is, words can hurt and they have the power to impact us for years, even decades. For McCarthy, these two words had stayed with him for nearly 40 years: brat pack. It’s a term Gen-Xers like me are familiar with, coined in 1985 by David Blum from New York Magazine.

What I didn’t realize was that Blum’s assignment was to write a piece on Emilio Estevez, who’s part of a new wave of budding talents dominating movies for teens and young adults. I never read the article, but McCarthy recalled in the documentary that it trivialized them as being ‘lightweights’ given their lack of formal training and that they like to party. He even thinks that it hurts their careers, saying that ‘Marty Scorsese, Steven Spielberg is not going to call up somebody who’s in the Brat Pack.’

This documentary is essentially an extension of his 2021 memoir titled Brat: An ‘80s Story, where he delves into this singular moment in time, sharing a candid exploration of growing up amidst a whirlwind of conflicting ambitions, addiction, and masculinity. Some of the 80s movies McCarthy starred in are considered modern classics now, i.e., Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo’s Fire, The Breakfast Club, and, to a um, lesser extent, Less than Zero. I always think of those guys being in the ‘cool kids club’ so it’s eye-opening to me that being part of the Brat Pack is considered a bad thing.

Truth be told, I’ve sort of forgotten about McCarthy for a long time, as the last movie I saw where he played the lead was Weekend at Bernie’s in 1989. The Joy Luck Club (1993) is the last movie I saw him in where he had a small role. I did rewatch Mannequin (1987) recently and it’s even sillier than I remember it. I enjoy his movies, but I don’t see him as a thespian the way I’d regard, say, Daniel Day Lewis or Christian Bale. Even he admitted he’s not really ‘an actor’s actor,’ though he certainly fit the roles he was cast in those popular 80s movies.

The documentary itself is fascinating in that it mimics McCarthy’s nervous energy. The camera never stops moving as it follows the actor around NYC and parts of California when he visits fellow Brat Pack members. Sometimes he’s walking while talking on the phone, other times he’s driving around, and he strikes me as someone who can’t sit still. Some of the grainy footage has a decidedly retro look that reflects that era, with a raw, unvarnished quality to it, down to McCarthy’s casually disheveled look that makes him look very un-Hollywood. In keeping with the 80s vibe is the enjoyable soundtrack: Love Will Tear Us Apart by Joy Division, Back In The High Life Again by Steve Winwood, to two of my favorites from St. Elmo’s Fire: Man in Motion by John Parr, and the gorgeous Love Theme by David Foster.

Those looking for an in-depth study of what Brat Pack means to McCarthy’s friends he interviewed won’t find that here, but its strength is in nostalgia. I enjoy seeing all the Brat Pack reunions, particularly the ones with Timothy Hutton, Lea Thompson, Rob Lowe, and Demi Moore, the latter is still very much in the cultural zeitgeist. In fact, Moore’s horror thriller The Substance premiered in Cannes just weeks before this doc’s release on Hulu. The perpetually chipper Lowe seems to be an eternal optimist, while Moore exudes wisdom in the way she looks at the Brat Pack’s stigma, for lack of a better word, and it’s lovely to see her warm, genial demeanor during the interviews. It’s also interesting to get perspectives from non-actors, such as authors

Malcolm Gladwell and Bret Easton Ellis, pop-culture critic Ira Madison III, and film producer Lauren Shuler Donner. Molly Ringwald and Judd Nelson declined to participate, though the movie ended with McCarthy taking a call from Nelson.

McCarthy saves the interview with Blum last. One might expect that there might be tension between them, but their conversation is surprisingly pretty civil, even warm. I guess it’s all ‘water under the bridge’ by this point and Blum revealed a particularly telling bit about why his article was so snarky towards this group of famous young actors. I’m not going to spoil it for you but I giggled when I heard him say it.

The way I see it, being a part of a pop-culture phenomenon certainly has its ups and downs. While he starts out as being down on being called a ‘brat,’ by the end McCarthy seems more at peace with it. Working on this documentary and talking things through must have been a cathartic experience. Brats isn’t the most riveting documentary I’ve seen, but it doesn’t aim to be one. It’s an amusing and reflective walk down memory lane, especially for Gen Xers like me, that shows how celebrities have the same insecurities, worries, and self-doubts as regular folks, if not more so.

BRATS is available to stream on HULU

Have you seen BRATS? I’d love to hear what you think!

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