In the long history of mo💦vies, perhaps no decade is as consequential or important as the 1☂980s. But in an era when unforgettable films opened in theaters practically every weekend, which of them actually deserve recognition as the greatest of them all?

During the two-term presidency of Ronald Reagan, the 1980s became a time characterized by rampant consumerism, materialism, and globalization via rapidly evolving technolog♋y. Movies of the time similarly took on many different facets. While adults still enjoyed grown-up pictures about topics relevant to them, from the nuances of d▨ating in their 30s and 40s to generational trauma wrought by the Vietnam War, younger audiences began to see more exciting movies cater to their tastes. Sometimes, wires crossed and movies ostensibly made for adults found a huge audience in kids and teens. 

The 1980s were a time when production budgets got bigger, the stars became more famous, violence became mainstream, and practically overnight audiences of every age could enjoy the same movies. “Blockbuster,” while coined in 1954, beﷺcame a commonplace phrase as event releases broke box-office records.

In a decade crammed full of great movies, only a few can earn𒁏 proper recognition as the best movies ever made. Here are the 32 best movies of the 1980s.

32. Platoon (1986)

Few directors embody the 1980s like Oliver Stone. Not only was he involved in scripting classics like Conan the Barbarian and Scarface, he also helmed 1987’s Wall Street – a picture emblematic of the decade’s insatiable greed – and an unconnected trilogy of movies that explored the lingering trauma of Vietnam. The first of them is 1986’s Platoon, a hard-hitting drama about a volunteer for the U.S. Army (played by Charlie Sheen) who spends his time with the 25th Infantry Division near the Cambodian border wrestling with the ethics of the very war they’re engaged in. The movie was inspired by Stone’s own💖 service in Vietnam, and that shows in the movie’s att🔴ention to detail and unflinching portrait of war’s lasting psychological wounds. 

31. Moonstruck (1987)

Directed by Norman Jewison and written by John Patrick Shanley, Cher and Nicolas Cage co-star in this delightfully mad-cap romantic comedy about an Italian-American widow who falls in love with the hot-tempe﷽red younger brother of her fiancé. While Cher was already a star when Moonstruck hit, the film also launched Nicolas Cage to the stratosphere. Between his sculpted arms, haggard visage, and low-key chaotic presence, Cage showed the world he could shine as bright as the Moon itself. Anything else he’s done since, from stealing the Declaration of Independence to swapping faces with John Travolta, has been because he made us lovestruck in Moonstruck.

30. Predator (1987)

After blowing up in the 1982 fantasy epic Conan the Barbarianꦬ, Arnold Schwarzenegger flexed his action hero muscles in Predator, a sci-fi thriller and war epic all in one. Directed by John McTiernan and featuring an unforgettable musical motifജ by Alan Silvestri, Predator follows an elite military rescue team who venture into the South American jungle to rescue a diplomatic hostage only to find themselves stalked by an otherworldly menace. In hindsight it’s hard to say who is the bigger star, Schwarzenegger or the now-iconic “Predator” alien. Either way, Predator is indisputably one of the most rollicking action movies of all time.