As the 80s drew to a close, John Hughes was still at the top of his game. After his successes with teen based dramas and comedies, he moved slightly into a more adult route with Planes, Trains And Automobiles and then slightly backtracked into family life with She's Having A Baby.

1989's Uncle Buck borrows heavily from both of the latter films. Starring Hughes favourite, John Candy, as the title character, the story revolves around the Russell family, made up of mum Cindy (Elaine Bromka), dad Bob (Garrett M. Brown) and kids Tia, Miles and Maizy (Jean Louisa Kelly, Macaulay Culkin and Gaby Hoffmann) who have just moved from Indianapolis to Chicago.

When Cindy's father suffers a heart attack, she and Bob make plans to get out there as soon as possible. With no other options of a babysitter, Bob is forced to ask his brother Buck if he would step in.

Buck is your typical loveable layabout loser who has coasted through life with a series of dead-end jobs and has a weakness for gambling and bowling. He suitably arrives in a comedy car that blows at every occasion.

Life at the Russell's isn't all happy families, however, with teenage daughter Tia still angry that her parents moved and Miles and Maizy being precocious at best.

While Miles and Maizy soon grow to love their uncle, Tia causes him more than a few headaches, especially once he is introduced to her boyfriend Bug ("Is his surname spray?") who Buck knows is only after one thing.

Buck also has to deal with his own love life with his long suffering girlfriend Chanice (Amy Madigan) chasing him for commitment. Things are further complicated when randy neighbour Marcie (Laurie Metcalf of Roseanne fame) decides to make a move on him. To exact revenge on Buck, Tia tells Chanice that he has been returning the favour and Chanice dumps him.

After sneaking out one night, Buck tracks Tia down to a party where Bug attempts to take her to bed. After drilling the door knob off he finds him with another girl. Tia had found out Buck was right all along and had left the party alone.

While driving home, Buck meets up with Tia and the pair have a heart to heart and to make her feel better Buck turns into a quiet corner and opens the trunk, revealing a tied up Bug and  forces him to apologise (with threats of drilling teeth). After letting him go (while still tied up!), Buck hits golf balls towards him as he flees into the night.

As per most family comedies, Buck and Chanice reunite to a happy ending and as the kids' parents return they come back together happier and stronger than before.

Uncle Buck is the first really totally family-friendly comedy that Hughes did and it sets the tone of the rest of his career. John Candy is well cast as the lovable rogue uncle and there are a few real laugh out loud moments with my two favourite being the giant pancakes he makes for little Miles' breakfast and his attempt to use an elementary school toilet.

However, the character of Buck is far from perfect and sometimes the spirit in which he does things comes across as rather hard and this tarnishes the film slightly.

There is also the issue with the character of Tia. She is almost a picture perfect annoying teen, but she just takes it slightly too far, which alienates the audience watching her and in the end you really want her to learn a real hard life lesson rather than just the fact her boyfriend is a loser.

The star of the show really is Macaulay Culkin. It's no surprise that after this he took the planet by storm in Home Alone, another John Hughes-penned movie, which he got the idea from while filming the letterbox scene during this film.

Uncle Buck was never going to win any awards and Hughes did make much better family movies, but this really did mark a total change in direction for Hughes and it would be the last movie he directed until 1991's Curly Sue. He did, however, manage to keep himself busy between then and next time I'll be taking a look at the projects that filled that gap then it's the big one you have all been waiting for - I will be revisiting Curly Sue.

• The Breakfast Club changed my life
• Weird Science: Making geeky cool
• Celebrating Ferris Bueller's Day Off
• Celebrating Pretty In Pink
• Celebrating Sixteen Candles
• Looking back at Some Kind Of Wonderful
• A look back at Planes, Trains And Automobiles
• Early John Hughes: National Lampoons, Mr Mom, Nate
• A look back at John Hughes' She's Having A Baby