While not complete strangers, the five are all from different cliques or social groups: John Bender (Judd Nelson) 'The Criminal' Claire Standish (Molly Ringwald) 'The Princess' Brian Johnson (Anthony Michael Hall) 'The Brain' Andy Clark (Emilio Estévez) 'The Athlete' and Allison Reynolds (Ally Sheedy) 'The Basket Case'. The plot follows five students at fictional Shermer High School in the widely used John Hughes setting of Shermer, Illinois (a fictitious suburb of Chicago based on Hughes' hometown of Northbrook, Illinois), as they report for Saturday detention on March 24, 1984.
