Cinema · 1980s Ranked
Best Films of the 1980s, Ranked by IQ Score
The decade Scorsese, Spielberg, Lynch, Lucas, Cameron, Kubrick, and the Coens all worked simultaneously. Ranked by IQ Score.
The 1980s in American film is the decade most commonly miscategorized as 'commercial overreach' by critics who remember the marketing more than the work. The rubric reads the actual filmography: Raging Bull (1980), The Shining (1980), Blade Runner (1982), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Aliens (1986), and the late-decade Scorsese-Lynch-Coens emergence all happened in the same ten years.
The IQ Scores below reflect what the structural ambition supports. The Spielberg-Lucas commercial work is given its proper genre credit; the more experimental work (Lynch, Jarmusch, the Coens' Blood Simple debut) is read as the formal-rigor it was. Several of the era's Masterclass entries, particularly Wim Wenders's Paris, Texas and Akira Kurosawa's Ran, are rarely included in retrospective rankings that focus on American box-office.
30 titles · ranked by IQ Score
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
9
-
10
-
11
-
12
-
13
-
14
-
15
-
16
-
17
-
18
-
19
-
20
-
21
-
22
-
23
-
24
-
25
-
26
-
27
-
28
-
29
-
30
Save this list. Get the next one.
New ranked lists and the editorials behind them, by email. Every list scored on the same published rubric. No spam, no studio money.
Founding Circle
Lifetime membership, one payment.
Founders get the monthly founders newsletter, quarterly deep dives with a 30-day founder-first window, two title requests a year, and a place on the founders wall. 100 lifetime spots at $99.
Claim your spot →Browse every ranked list on TV Intelligentsia
202 ranked-by-IQ lists, filmographies, decade hubs, year hubs, character rankings, streaming-platform lists, and editorial curations. All scored on the same published rubric.
See all ranked lists → Open the full database