What a golden era for Hollywood! The 1980s were a decade when directors and screenwriters were eager to look outside the box for big ideas, following the birth of the blockbuster in the 1970s. Stars were born, the Brat Pack ruled supreme, and movie executives cashed in big time (and to their own private islands). Are you an expert on '80s cinema? Take this quiz and prove it!
Name This 80s Movie!
Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
Back to the Future
Back to the Future is a 1985 American science fiction film directed by Robert Zemeckis, and written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale. It stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover, and Thomas F. Wilson. Set in 1985, the story follows Marty McFly (Fox), a teenager accidentally sent back to 1955 in a time-traveling DeLorean automobile built by his eccentric scientist friend Doctor Emmett “Doc” Brown (Lloyd).
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
The Empire Strikes Back (also known as Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back) is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner, with a screenplay by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas. The sequel to Star Wars (1977), it is the second film in the Star Wars film series and the fifth chronological chapter of the “Skywalker Saga”.
Name This 80s Movie!
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, with a screenplay by Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman. It stars Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman, Ronald Lacey, John Rhys-Davies, and Denholm Elliott. Ford portrays Indiana Jones, a globe-trotting archaeologist vying with Nazi German forces in 1936 to recover the long-lost Ark of the Covenant, a relic said to make an army invincible.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
The Terminator
The Terminator is a 1984 American science fiction action film directed by James Cameron. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator, a cyborg assassin sent back in time from 2029 to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton), whose unborn son will one day save mankind from extinction by Skynet, a hostile artificial intelligence in a post-apocalyptic future.
Name This 80s Movie!
Big Trouble in Little China
Ghostbusters
Ghostbusters is a 1984 American supernatural comedy film directed and produced by Ivan Reitman, and written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis. It stars Bill Murray, Aykroyd, and Ramis as Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, and Egon Spengler, three eccentric parapsychologists who start a ghost-catching business in New York City.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
The Breakfast Club
The Breakfast Club is a 1985 American teen coming-of-age comedy-drama film written, produced, and directed by John Hughes. It stars Emilio Estevez, Anthony Michael Hall, Judd Nelson, Molly Ringwald, and Ally Sheedy as teenagers from different high school cliques who spend a Saturday in detention with their authoritarian assistant principal, played by Paul Gleason.
Name This 80s Movie!
Adventures in Babysitting
The Goonies
The Goonies is a 1985 American adventure comedy film co-produced and directed by Richard Donner from a screenplay by Chris Columbus, based on a story by Steven Spielberg. In the film, kids who live in the “Goon Docks” neighborhood of Astoria, Oregon, attempt to save their homes from foreclosure and, in doing so, they discover an old treasure map that takes them on an adventure to unearth the long-lost fortune of One-Eyed Willy, a legendary 17th-century pirate.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi
Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi
Return of the Jedi (also known as Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi) is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand. The screenplay is by Lawrence Kasdan and George Lucas from a story by Lucas, who was also the executive producer. The sequel to Star Wars (1977)[a] and The Empire Strikes Back (1980), it is the third installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, the third film to be produced, and the sixth chronological film in the “Skywalker Saga”.
Name This 80s Movie!
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is a 1989 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, from a story co-written by executive producer George Lucas. It is the third installment in the Indiana Jones franchise and a sequel to Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981). Harrison Ford returned in the title role, while his father is portrayed by Sean Connery. Other cast members featured include Alison Doody, Denholm Elliott, Julian Glover, River Phoenix, and John Rhys-Davies. In the film, set largely in 1938, Indiana searches for his father, a Holy Grail scholar, who has been captured by the Nazis while on a journey to find the Holy Grail.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is a 1986 American teen comedy film written, co-produced, and directed by John Hughes, co-produced by Tom Jacobson, and starring Matthew Broderick, Mia Sara, and Alan Ruck. It tells the story of a high school slacker who skips school for a day in Chicago and regularly breaks the fourth wall to explain his techniques and inner thoughts.
Name This 80s Movie!
Stand by Me
Stand by Me is a 1986 American coming-of-age story directed by Rob Reiner. It is based on Stephen King’s 1982 novella The Body, and the title derives from the song by Ben E. King. Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, and Jerry O’Connell star as four boys who, in 1959, go on a hike to find the dead body of a missing boy. Stand by Me was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and for two Golden Globe Awards: one for Best Drama Motion Picture and one for Best Director.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Die Hard
Die Hard is a 1988 American action film directed by John McTiernan, with a screenplay by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on the 1979 novel Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorp, and it stars Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman, Alexander Godunov, and Bonnie Bedelia. Die Hard follows New York City police detective John McClane (Willis) who is caught up in a terrorist takeover of a Los Angeles skyscraper while visiting his estranged wife.
Name This 80s Movie!
Honey, I Shrunk the Kids Highlander
The Karate Kid
The Karate Kid is a 1984 American martial arts drama film written by Robert Mark Kamen and directed by John G. Avildsen. It is the first installment in the Karate Kid franchise, and stars Ralph Macchio, Pat Morita, Elisabeth Shue and William Zabka.[3][4] The Karate Kid follows Daniel LaRusso (Macchio), a teenager taught karate by Mr. Miyagi (Morita) to help defend himself and compete in a tournament against his bullies, one of whom is Johnny Lawrence (Zabka), the ex-boyfriend of his love interest Ali Mills (Shue).
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
The Princess Bride
The Princess Bride is a 1987 American fantasy comedy romance film directed and co-produced by Rob Reiner, starring Cary Elwes, Robin Wright, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon, Wallace Shawn, André the Giant, and Christopher Guest. The film preserves the novel’s metafictional narrative style by presenting the story as a book being read by a grandfather (Peter Falk) to his sick grandson (Fred Savage).
Name This 80s Movie!
Lethal Weapon
Lethal Weapon is a 1987 American buddy cop action film directed and co-produced by Richard Donner, written by Shane Black, and co-produced by Joel Silver. It stars Mel Gibson and Danny Glover alongside Gary Busey, Tom Atkins, Darlene Love, and Mitchell Ryan. In Lethal Weapon, a pair of mismatched LAPD detectives – Martin Riggs (Gibson), a former Green Beret who has become suicidal following the death of his wife, and veteran officer Roger Murtaugh (Glover) – work together as partners.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (or simply E.T.) is a 1982 American science fiction film produced and directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Melissa Mathison. It tells the story of Elliott, a boy who befriends an extraterrestrial dubbed E.T., who is left behind on Earth. Along with his friends and family, Elliott must find a way to help E.T. find his way home. The film stars Dee Wallace, Peter Coyote, Robert MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, and Henry Thomas.
Name This 80s Movie!
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation is a 1989 American Christmas comedy film and the third installment in National Lampoon magazine’s Vacation film series. Christmas Vacation was directed by Jeremiah S. Chechik, written and co-produced by John Hughes, and starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, and Randy Quaid with supporting roles by Miriam Flynn, William Hickey, Mae Questel, Diane Ladd, John Randolph, E.G. Marshall, Doris Roberts, Juliette Lewis, and Johnny Galecki, and special appearances by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Nicholas Guest, Ellen Hamilton Latzen, Brian Doyle-Murray, and Natalia Nogulich.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Beetlejuice
Beetlejuice is a 1988 American fantasy comedy film directed by Tim Burton, produced by The Geffen Company, and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. The plot revolves around a recently deceased couple (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) who, as ghosts haunting their former home, contact Betelgeuse (pronounced and occasionally spelled Beetlejuice in the film and portrayed by Michael Keaton), an obnoxious and devious “bio-exorcist” from the Netherworld, to scare away the house’s new inhabitants (Catherine O’Hara, Jeffrey Jones, and Winona Ryder).
Name This 80s Movie!
Aliens
Aliens is a 1986 science fiction action film written and directed by James Cameron. It is the sequel to the 1979 science fiction horror film Alien, and the second film in the Alien franchise. Set in the far future, the film stars Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley, the sole survivor of an alien attack on her ship. When communications are lost with a human colony on the moon on which her crew first encountered the alien creatures, Ripley agrees to return to the site with a troop of Colonial Marines to investigate.
Can You Name This 80s Movie?
Top Gun
Top Gun is a 1986 American action film directed by Tony Scott, and produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer, in association with Paramount Pictures. The screenplay was written by Jim Cash and Jack Epps Jr., and was inspired by an article titled “Top Guns”, written by Ehud Yonay and published in California magazine three years earlier. The film stars Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis, with Val Kilmer, Anthony Edwards, and Tom Skerritt in supporting roles. Cruise plays Lieutenant Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, a young naval aviator aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise.
Sadly, you failed this quiz!
WE STILL GOT LOTS OF QUIZ THAT YOU CAN TRY
Average Score? Hmmm. Not bad!
BUT YOU CAN DO BETTER NEXT TIME
You slayed and aced this test!
You just prove that you are an 80s movie expert!
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