These Go To Eleven: The 10 Best Films Of The Eighties

Join us in our decade-based film retrospective, as we delve backwards all the way from 2009 to 1910. Most decade-based best movie lists grant you a whooping 50-100 entries, which makes perfect sense given all the years you have to take into consideration. But what if you were defining a decade in just ten films? Which movies would you recommend to somebody who might only watch a handful from a given decade? This week, we look back at the Eighties.

T.J. Barnard Nov 28, 2012 10:52 am2014-05-11T22:46:26-05:00

9. E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (1982) (Dir. Steven Spielberg)

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It could have been laughable, but Steven Spielberg managed to make his boy meets alien story something genuine and sincere: a motion picture that captured the hearts of everyone who went to see it. The story is a simple affair, one which concerns the friendship between a young boy named Elliot and E..T., a plant-based lifeform from outer space who is accidentally abandoned on our planet. E.T. is an unashamedly sentimental affair, a celebration of life, family and friendship, but the movie’s edgy humour and its antagonist shotgun-toting G-Men grant it personality. The set-pieces are now all but devoured by pop cultural aficionados, although there is truly no beating the final 15-minute bike chase sequence (emphasised by John Williams’ spelling score) for pure cinematic exhilaration.

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