Career Opportunities

Career Opportunities is a 1991 American comedy set largely inside a department store. Jim Dodge is a young man with a habit of losing jobs, and his father gives him an ultimatum: get serious about work or leave home. He takes a night cleaning shift at a local store, where he finds himself locked in after hours. Josie McClellan, a wealthy classmate of Jim's, is also trapped there, having hidden away to get some distance from her father and her life of privilege. The two spend the night together in the empty building, discovering how much they have in common despite coming from opposite worlds. Their time alone is interrupted when two inept robbers break into the store and take them hostage.

The film was directed by Bryan Gordon and written and produced by John Hughes, who had built a career in the 1980s around comedies about teenagers and young adults, including the screenplays for National Lampoon's Vacation and The Breakfast Club. Career Opportunities came out after those films, at a point when Hughes was continuing to write and produce projects rather than direct them. Frank Whaley and Jennifer Connelly lead the cast as Jim and Josie, with brothers Dermot and Kieran Mulroney playing the thieves, and John M. Jackson and Jenny O'Hara as Jim's parents. The supporting cast and crew together number more than sixty people.

The film runs 83 minutes. It was made for about 6 million dollars and took in roughly 11 million worldwide, a modest return on its production cost. On IMDb it holds a rating of 5.9 from around 21,000 votes, while on TMDB it sits at 6.9 from far fewer votes, suggesting the audience response is mixed rather than enthusiastic. A critics' rating of 4.9 from 19 reviews is lower than both audience scores.