Movies from the 1980s that anyone born after 1990 needs to watch

Hello all

In my part time job at the Lord Ted, I work with a lot of people were born in the latter half of the 1990s, meaning that by the time that they reached an age where they can remember stuff, they had virtually no chance of watch or hearing of. So below are five movies from the 1980s that won't be well known by the younger generation that I would highly recommend.

Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)

Long before before he was Neo in The Matrix, Keanu Reeves was part of a film about two high school slackers who are about to fail their history class. They make a half-arsed attempt at their last report before a person from the future comes and tells them that they eventually form a band that brings world peace, however, they must pass their history class to do it was Reeves' character will be sent to military school if they fail.

They use a telephone booth to travel through time and gather various famous figures from history, such as Billy the Kid, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, Sigmund Freud and various others. Various problems occur along the way, such as having part of their booth destroyed by a member of Ghengis Khan's army, and they struggle to deal with it due to their slacker nature.

This is a fun movie and definitely the type that you don't get these days. It's 90 or so minutes of fun. It was so successful that a sequel came out in the early 90s, although the lacked some of the charm of the original and had a much, much darker tone, including being killed by clones and having to fight their way through the after life in order to save their girlfriends.

There is also talks of a third film coming out soon, but given that Reeves and co-star Alex Winter have gone on to have significantly different careers, it'd be surprisingly if it does ever come out.

Spaceballs (1987)

Arguably the biggest films of the 1980s were the second and third installments of the original Star Wars trilogy, but they were far from immune from the Mel Brooks treatment. Mel Brooks was one of the main spoof directors of the 80s and 90s and his legacy ranged from westerns to Robin Hood, however, this spoof of Star Wars is probably the best of the lot.

The story is that the people from the planet Spaceball are running out of oxygen and have decided to steal their air from a nearby planet. Meanwhile, on the nearby planet, a princess is getting married but runs out on her groom and the king hires a guy called Lonestar to track her down, eventually the two stories meet and Lonestar tries to prevent Dark Helmet (the leader of the Spaceball army) from executing the plan.

Spaceballs is one of those great films where you can just sit back and enjoy, it takes no thinking power whatsoever and it's just fun, a thing that a lot of movies of today have forgot about. I guarantee you will laugh and if you're not a big Star Wars fan, you will find this brilliant.

Willow (1988)

My favourite film comes from the 1980s. I love this film.

The storyline is about a baby that is destined to kill a witch who controls the land. The baby ends up in a village of Nelwyns (basically midgets) and in particular, Willow (played by Warrick Davis). He and several others set off on a trip to find the nearest Dikini (normal sized humans)  but ends up staying with the baby even after they find someone who agrees to take her....Madmartigan. What follows is the struggle that the good guys have against the witch's army, as well as the desperation to protect this baby.

The film revolutionised morphing technology and was a true pioneering film of the industry. I love this movie as it has pretty much everything, action, adventure, comedy, drama, war, romance, horror, everything is rolled into this film and it fits the bill regardless of what mood you are in.

Unfortunately Willow didn't do that well at the box office and that's why many people from the younger generation haven't heard of this film, other than from myself probably. It was the first film featuring Val Kilmer as the lead actor, and also Warwick Davis' first appearance on a film where he wasn't covered in prosthetics or heavy, heavy make up.

Krull (1983)

Krull is a film from the 1980s that I doubt many from the 80s will remember or even heard of. I can't even

remember when I first saw this film but all around, it was quite a good film.

The story is about a prince and princess are set to wed on an alien planet before a destructive alien race kidnaps the princess. The prince then goes on an adventure with a vast array of different characters, such as a wizard, a cyclops, a magician and various bandits. Throughout it all their journey to the ever-moving castle, they have to deal with the powers of the alien leader taking over various members of them, their struggles as members of their team are regularly killed and the various personal difficulties throughout.

In what was a largely unknown cast at the time, it contained several people who would become very well known actors in holiday, such as Liam Neeson, Robbie Coltrane and Alun Armstrong.

Much like Willow this film had a lot of different elements to it, with the exception of comedy, and again is a good all around romp. It's slow paced though with a lot of time dedicated to character development.

Masters of the Universe (1987)

Basically "He Man" the movie was a film I had largely forgotten about until I found it recently on Youtube.

The story for this is that a key that can open doors to any world has been sent to Earth accidentally and the evil Skeletor wants it, however, He-Man and his team try to defend Earth and the key. Meanwhile, a young couple are dealing with their personal difficulties and the two storylines mix, making He-Man's task all the more difficult.

He man is a film that doesn't take itself too serious, whilst not actually being a comedy. If you like a good old sci-fi romp with some terrible acting then this is the film for you. It has it's moments throughout and whilst not a brilliant film, it's certainly not a boring one.

If you've got about 2 hours to kill then I would recommend this film. Again, you will think at several points that it is a bit rubbish, it's certainly not one for the awards categories, but again, it's a good laugh and for a non-comedy film, it does have it's moments again, although nothing I can personally point out.