A culture icon and a heartwarming adventure film, Steven Spielberg’s E.T. is the landmark movie that finally ended the stuffy 70s and began the 80s as we know and love it.
Kategoria: Family
#357 The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)
Always watch-worthy due to the celebrity cameos and the amazing puppetry, but this 1984 movie is a bit tame and lacks the amazing absurdness that makes the Muppets great.
#333 The Princess Bride (1987)
Combining romance, fairytale, adventure and humor, The Princess Bride pulls of the impossible task of being great entertainment for the whole family, without being childish.
#328 Xmas 2015: It Nearly Wasn’t Christmas (1989)
No chills, no thrills TV-movie does not surprise or offend anyone, and is a easy – but totally forgottable – christmas day pass time for the whole family.
#301 Flight of the Navigator (1986)
Despite the talking spaceship (played by Paul Reubens) being a much too weak co-star, Flight of the Navigator does capture nicely some of that magic of being a child .
#204 Going Bananas (1987)
Built entirely upon a lousy monkey costume and cake in the face kind of humor, Going Bananas is made solely for kids – but will surely insult your intelligence even if you are a 7-year old kid.
#129 Parenthood (1989)
Parenthood seems on the surface like a nice and neat little flick watered down for the whole family to enjoy, but luckily performs a lot bolder and stronger than anticipated.
Infact, the movie is really very entertaining, an almost perfect mix of drama and comedy.
80s-o-meter: 89%
Total: 87%
#66 Christmas 2014: A Christmas Story (1983)
A modern classic that encapsulates in a beautiful and hilarious way what it feels to be a kid during the Christmas better than any movie before or after it.
80s-o-meter: 15%
Total: 94%
#65 Christmas 2014: Christmas Vacation (1989)
If your Christmas could use some good laughs, you won’t go much wrong with this Griswald Family’s third vacation movie instalment.
80s-o-meter: 93%
Total: 95%
#64 Christmas 2014: Christmas Comes to Willow Creek (1987)
Mullets ahoy!
The Dukes of Hazzard deliver a truckful of Christmas to Alaska in Christmas Comes to Willow Creek, a TV-movie that has a great premise, family feuds, fist fights and a ridiculously silly ending.
80s-o-meter: 81%
Total: 68%
#62 Christmas 2014: Ernest Saves Christmas (1988)
Before his untimely death Jim Varney’s Ernest character clowned around throughout the eighties to much amusement for us kids. Rubber-faced Varney’s simple, but good willing doofus character was slapstick at its purest form, with most of the humour relying on pure physical comedy and silly facial gestures. While one could argue this is the lowest form of comedy, Varney was one of the rare talents of the art among with the likes of Jim Carrey.
Ernest Saves Christmas tells a story of an ageing santa who needs someone slightly younger to take over the business, much like a pope. His chosen one is a children TV host called Joe (Oliver Clark), who lives in the faraway land of Hollywood.
There’s not too much to be explained here, it’s a simple movie with no hidden agendas, subtexts or complex plots and something that can be taken with just the face value. It succeeds in delivering most of the stuff it goes after and executes most of it with just the right kind of professional assertiveness.
It’s a good christmas watch for the whole family with a good amount of suspension, humour and kindness, and definitely one of the christmas movies that should not be forgotten.
And Jim, while we are a it; thanks for all the laughs!
80s-o-meter: 95%
Total: 84%
#61 Christmas 2014: Santa Claus The Movie (1985)
In a similar style to many superhero movies still to date, Santa Claus: The Movie sets out to tell the origin story of how the world’s most indulgent gift-giver came to be. Whether this really needs to be told, and not left more as a magical mystery, this is the portion of the movie that works.
The second part revolves around current time in a big city where a childrens toy tycoon (John Lithgow) tries to steal the christmas for himself with an elf (Dudley Moore) living in exile. It all gets very disoriented fast and as good as Lithgow is as the villain of the movie, the script doesn’t give him much to work with.
While I appreciate the attempt to tie in the commercialization of the christmas with the whole concept, I found myself snoozing off a LOT at this point.
In the very end the film turns out to an action movie with chases and bombs – and somehow misses that whole christmas thing.
This is the kind of movie I wouldn’t mind having open in the TV in the christmas eve as just a background noise, if you know what I mean. As an actual movie I’d sit down and watch, I’ll be skipping it in the future.
80s-o-meter: 65%
Total: 55%