More of an experience than a movie, Xanadu is full of neon magic, great songs and good moments like Gene Kelly’s musical numbers – which unfortunately don’t make a good movie.
80s-o-meter: 80%
Total: 38%
Category: 1980
#610 Gloria (1980)
A tribute to Rowlands’ is exceptional silver screen presence and talent, Gloria is a blunt yet heartful depiction of a friendship between a woman and a kid left orphaned by the mob.
80s-o-meter: 58%
Total: 90%
#596 The Mountain Men (1980)
Charles Heston’s western adventure in an outdated 1950’s style, The Mountain Men has some surprising – although limited – old time charm to it, and the vast sceneries of Wyoming are a sight to behold
80s-o-meter: 0%
Total: 58%
#592 Superman II (1980)
The sequel to the 1978 original adds some cartoony action to the mix, but unfortunaly hasn’t aged well and is relevant only if you spent your childhood reading the Superman comics
80s-o-meter: 45%
Total: 62%
#584 Urban Cowboy (1980)
Travolta delivers a solid blue collar, wanna-be cowboy performance, but the unlikeable, immature characters in this love triangle make one wish none of them never ended up together
80s-o-meter: 55%
Total: 58%
#580 Private Benjamin (1980)
A waste of a very nice poster, Private Benjamin shows a limited potential as a girl-powered army farce, but side tracks far too many times to countless of uninteresting paths.
80s-o-meter: 50%
Total: 48%
#579 Heaven’s Gate (1980)
A victim of its own grandeur, Heaven’s Gate remains in the history as the expensive failure, but no doubt reaches greatness many times during its outstretched 3-hour running time.
80s-o-meter: 12%
Total: 68%
#571 Battle Beyond the Stars (1980)
Robert Vaughn, John Saxon and the FX team make a valiant effort here, but Battle Beyond The Stars’ vision is just so clumsy and blurry it all ends up a waste of the time and talent.
80s-o-meter: 58%
Total: 43%
#570 Wolf Lake (1980)
Wolf Lake surprises on the solid performances and the way it builds up the tension, but following that setup to the end is nowhere as stellar as one would’ve hoped for.
80s-o-meter: 35%
Total: 58%
#561 Flash Gordon (1980)
Look, I just wasted two hours of my life with this one, please don’t do the same.
80s-o-meter: 0%
Total: 0%
#544 The Exterminator (1980)
While the so called plot is just an excuse for to go from one graphic kill to another, The Exterminator is still a definite 80s cult classic that in its own hedonistic way set the tone for the whole new decade.
80s-o-meter: 80%
Total: 65%
#542 Alligator (1980)
Heavily influenced by the likes of Jaws and Piranhas, Alligator is a clumsy and badly aged early 80s monster film that’s shoddy, but gets kind of enjoyable every time it goes hilariously overboard.
80s-o-meter: 50%
Total: 53%
#524 My Bodyguard (1980)
The cheapish ending aside, My Bodyguard is in fact a beautiful movie about reaching out for a friend – and a real triumph for the young actors Chris Makepeace, Adam Baldwin and Matthew Dillon for their respective portrayals.
80s-o-meter: 60%
Total: 87%
#522 The Octagon (1980)
The real suspense and action kick in during only the last 20 minutes of the movie – but before that the only thing Chuck Norris’ The Octagon has to offer an endless parade of bad dialogue and disconnected events.
80s-o-meter: 65%
Total: 35%
#489 Seems Like Old Times (1980)
Goldie Hawn and Charles Grodin set up a marvellous show that keeps the movie afloat, but the script leaves Chevy Chase with nothing but an endless series of unwitty remarks.
#473 Altered States (1980)
Notable for having still respectable FX made in the era when FX didn’t really exist, Altered States’ trippy concept doesn’t wow anymore, but it’s still a really interesting watch.
#421 Motel Hell (1980)
What seems like another poorly aged horror movie at first, Motel Hell is just so utterly ruthlessly gross and bizarre that by the end the positives outweight its shortcomings.
#394 The Unseen (1980)
The Unseen and its cast has some of that good weird, twisted old black and white horror movie quality to them, but the horror presented here looks just plain unintentionally comical.
#382 Caddyshack (1980)
Caddyshack is a comedy that enjoys huge following still to date works well and feels timeless – but only when it concentrates on its golf humor bits with Rodney Dangerfield and Ted Knight, while many of the other parts have not aged that well and feel more like distracting fillers.
#370 Herbie Goes Bananas (1980)
The series had run its course a long time before this fourth Herbie movie was released on 1980, and clearly Herbie Goes Bananas just did not need to exist at all.