The 40 most popular 1980s movies, ranked. Click any film for ratings, reviews, trailers, and where to watch.


Friday the 13th
1980 · 1h 35m · US
Camp counselors are stalked and murdered by an unknown assailant while trying to reopen a summer camp that was the site of a child's drowning.


Pet Sematary
1989 · 1h 43m · US
After the Creed family's cat is accidentally killed, a friendly neighbor advises its burial in a mysterious nearby cemetery.


Back to the Future
1985 · 1h 56m · US
Eighties teenager Marty McFly is accidentally sent back in time to 1955, inadvertently disrupting his parents' first meeting and attracting his mother's romantic interest. Marty must repair the damage to history by rekindling his parents' romance and - with the help of his eccentric inventor friend Doc Brown - return to 1985.


The Shining
1980 · 2h 24m · UK
Jack Torrance accepts a caretaker job at the Overlook Hotel, where he, along with his wife Wendy and their son Danny, must live isolated from the rest of the world for the winter. But they aren't prepared for the madness that lurks within.


Stand and Deliver
1988 · 1h 43m · US
Jaime Escalante is a mathematics teacher in a school in a hispanic neighbourhood. Convinced that his students have potential, he adopts unconventional teaching methods to try and turn gang members and no-hopers into some of the country's top algebra and calculus students.


The Thing
1982 · 1h 49m · US
A research team in Antarctica is hunted by a shape-shifting alien that assumes the appearance of its victims.


My Neighbor Totoro
1988 · 1h 26m · JP
Two sisters move to the country with their father in order to be closer to their hospitalized mother, and discover the surrounding trees are inhabited by Totoros, magical spirits of the forest. When the youngest runs away from home, the older sister seeks help from the spirits to find her.


Scarface
1983 · 2h 50m · US
After getting a green card in exchange for assassinating a Cuban government official, Tony Montana stakes a claim on the drug trade in Miami. Viciously murdering anyone who stands in his way, Tony eventually becomes the biggest drug lord in the state, controlling nearly all the cocaine that comes through Miami. But increased pressure from the police, wars with Colombian drug cartels and his own drug-fueled paranoia serve to fuel the flames of his eventual downfall.


A Nightmare on Elm Street
1984 · 1h 31m · US
Teenagers in a small town are dropping like flies, apparently in the grip of mass hysteria causing their suicides. A cop's daughter, Nancy Thompson, traces the cause to child molester Fred Krueger, who was burned alive by angry parents many years before. Krueger has now come back in the dreams of his killers' children, claiming their lives as his revenge. Nancy and her boyfriend, Glen, must devise a plan to lure the monster out of the realm of nightmares and into the real world...


The Terminator
1984 · 1h 48m · UK
In the post-apocalyptic future, reigning tyrannical supercomputers teleport a cyborg assassin known as the "Terminator" back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, whose unborn son is destined to lead insurgents against 21st century mechanical hegemony. Meanwhile, the human-resistance movement dispatches a lone warrior to safeguard Sarah. Can he stop the virtually indestructible killing machine?


Dead Poets Society
1989 · 2h 9m · US
At an elite, old-fashioned boarding school in New England, a passionate English teacher inspires his students to rebel against convention and seize the potential of every day, courting the disdain of the stern headmaster.


Blade Runner
1982 · 1h 58m · US
In the smog-choked dystopian Los Angeles of 2019, blade runner Rick Deckard is called out of retirement to terminate a quartet of replicants who have escaped to Earth seeking their creator for a way to extend their short life spans.


Aliens
1986 · 2h 17m · US
Ripley, the sole survivor of the Nostromo's deadly encounter with the monstrous Alien, returns to Earth after drifting through space in hypersleep for 57 years. Although her story is initially met with skepticism, she agrees to accompany a team of Colonial Marines back to LV-426.


Die Hard
1988 · 2h 12m · US
High above the city of L.A. a team of terrorists has seized a building, taken hostages, and declared war. One man has manages to escape... An off-duty cop hiding somewhere inside. He's alone, tired... and the only chance anyone has got.


Raiders of the Lost Ark
1981 · 1h 55m · US
When Dr. Indiana Jones – the tweed-suited professor who just happens to be a celebrated archaeologist – is hired by the government to locate the legendary Ark of the Covenant, he finds himself up against the entire Nazi regime.


Predator
1987 · 1h 47m · US
A team of elite commandos on a secret mission in a Central American jungle come to find themselves hunted by an extraterrestrial warrior.


The Empire Strikes Back
1980 · 2h 4m · US
The epic saga continues as Luke Skywalker, in hopes of defeating the evil Galactic Empire, learns the ways of the Jedi from aging master Yoda. But Darth Vader is more determined than ever to capture Luke. Meanwhile, rebel leader Princess Leia, cocky Han Solo, Chewbacca, and droids C-3PO and R2-D2 are thrown into various stages of capture, betrayal and despair.


Beetlejuice
1988 · 1h 32m · US
A newly dead New England couple seeks help from a deranged demon exorcist to scare an affluent New York family out of their home.


Warriors of the Wind
1984 · 1h 35m · JP
After a global war, the seaside kingdom known as the Valley of the Wind remains one of the last strongholds on Earth untouched by a poisonous jungle and the powerful insects that guard it. Led by the courageous Princess Nausicaä, the people of the Valley engage in an epic struggle to restore the bond between humanity and Earth.


Top Gun
1986 · 1h 50m · US
For Lieutenant Pete 'Maverick' Mitchell and his friend and co-pilot Nick 'Goose' Bradshaw, being accepted into an elite training school for fighter pilots is a dream come true. But a tragedy, as well as personal demons, will threaten Pete's dreams of becoming an ace pilot.


Once Upon a Time in America
1984 · 2h 19m · IT
A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life.


Kiki's Delivery Service
1989 · 1h 43m · JP
A young witch, on her mandatory year of independent life, finds fitting into a new community difficult while she supports herself by running an air courier service.


Ghostbusters
1984 · 1h 45m · US
After losing their university jobs, three parapsychologists start a ghost-catching business in New York City and uncover a supernatural threat that could destroy the world.


Child's Play
1988 · 1h 27m · US
After being shot in a toy store, a serial killer transfers his soul into a Good Guy doll. A mother then gifts it to her six-year-old son Andy, which unleashes terror upon the city.


The Little Mermaid
1989 · 1h 23m · US
This colorful adventure tells the story of an impetuous mermaid princess named Ariel who falls in love with the very human Prince Eric and puts everything on the line for the chance to be with him. Memorable songs and characters -- including the villainous sea witch Ursula.


E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
1982 · 1h 55m · US
An alien is left behind on Earth and saved by the 10-year-old Elliott who decides to keep him hidden in his home. While a task force hunts for the extra-terrestrial, Elliott, his brother, and his little sister Gertie form an emotional bond with their new friend, and try to help him find his way home.


First Blood
1982 · 1h 33m · US
When former Green Beret John Rambo is harassed by local law enforcement and arrested for vagrancy, he is forced to flee into the mountains and wage an escalating one-man war against his pursuers.


Dune
1984 · 2h 16m · US
In the year 10,191, the most precious substance in the universe is the spice Melange. The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. The spice exists on only one planet in the entire universe, the vast desert planet Arrakis, also known as Dune. Its native inhabitants, the Fremen, have long held a prophecy that a man would come, a messiah who would lead them to true freedom.


Back to the Future Part II
1989 · 1h 48m · US
Marty and Doc are at it again as the time-traveling duo head to 2015 to nip some McFly family woes in the bud. But things go awry thanks to bully Biff Tannen and a pesky sports almanac. In a last-ditch attempt to set things straight, Marty finds himself bound for 1955 and face to face with his teenage parents -- again.


The Fly
1986 · 1h 36m · US
When brilliant, eccentric scientist Seth Brundle makes a huge technological breakthrough in teleportation, he decides to test it on himself. Unbeknownst to him, a common housefly manages to get inside the device and the two become one.


Gremlins
1984 · 1h 46m · US
After receiving an exotic small animal as a Christmas gift, a young man inadvertently breaks three important rules concerning his new pet, which unleashes a horde of malevolently mischievous creatures on a small town.


Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
1989 · 2h 7m · US
In 1938, an art collector appeals to eminent archaeologist Dr. Indiana Jones to embark on a search for the Holy Grail. Indy learns that a medieval historian has vanished while searching for it, and the missing man is his own father, Dr. Henry Jones Sr.. He sets out to rescue his father by following clues in the old man's notebook, which his father had mailed to him before he went missing. Indy arrives in Venice, where he enlists the help of a beautiful academic, Dr. Elsa Schneider, along with Marcus Brody and Sallah. Together they must stop the Nazis from recovering the power of eternal life and taking over the world!


Castle in the Sky
1986 · 2h 5m · JP
A young boy and a girl with a magic crystal must race against pirates and foreign agents in a search for a legendary floating castle.


Senza vergogna
1986 · 1h 34m · IT
A partially paralyzed teenager is failing to have sex for the first time. He's eager but clumsy and sickly, so the local country girls reject him. He starts to realize that the only affectionate person in his life is his beautiful mother.


The Evil Dead
1983 · 1h 25m · US
In 1979, a group of college students find a Sumerian Book of the Dead in an old wilderness cabin they've rented for a weekend getaway.


Ran
1985 · 2h 40m · JP
Shakespeare's King Lear is reimagined as a singular historical epic set in sixteenth-century Japan where an aging warlord divides his kingdom between his three sons.


The Princess Bride
1987 · 1h 39m · US
In this enchantingly cracked fairy tale, the beautiful Princess Buttercup and the dashing Westley must overcome staggering odds to find happiness amid six-fingered swordsmen, murderous princes, Sicilians and rodents of unusual size. But even death can't stop these true lovebirds from triumphing.


Akira
1988 · 2h 4m · JP
A secret military project endangers Neo-Tokyo when it turns a biker gang member into a rampaging psychic psychopath that only two teenagers and a group of psychics can stop.


Full Metal Jacket
1987 · 1h 57m · UK
A pragmatic U.S. Marine observes the dehumanizing effects the U.S.-Vietnam War has on his fellow recruits from their brutal boot camp training to the bloody street fighting in Hue.


Batman
1989 · 2h 6m · US
Having witnessed his parents' brutal murder as a child, millionaire philanthropist Bruce Wayne fights crime in Gotham City disguised as Batman, a costumed hero who strikes fear into the hearts of villains. But when a deformed madman known as 'The Joker' seizes control of Gotham's criminal underworld, Batman must face his most ruthless nemesis ever while protecting both his identity and his love interest, reporter Vicki Vale.
The 1980s codified the blockbuster — high concept, wide release, heavy merchandising — while home video quietly built a second life for films that flopped in theaters. Practical effects hit their peak just before CGI arrived.