Last month marked the 30th anniversary of John Hughes’ teen movie classic, “The Breakfast Club,” an event marked on social media and by Universal Studios, which is re-releasing it in theaters this month for a limited time.
The film is almost as popular today as it was back in 1985, but so are a lot of other great films from that year, most notably Robert Zemeckis’ sci-fi adventure “Back to the Future.” That same year, Michael J. Fox starred as the original “Teen Wolf” at the height of his popularity.
Richard Donner’s “The Goonies” was the hit family adventure that summer, while Tom Holland’s original “Fright Night” was the go-to horror flick for the slightly older viewers, and Ron Howard’s “Cocoon” was the surprise sci-fi hit with the much older crowd.
Tim Burton, Martin Scorsese and Terry Gilliam released their cult films “Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure,” “After Hours” and “Brazil” for the alternative crowds. The brat pack was on top with young audiences in “St. Elmo’s Fire” and “Weird Science,” and young girls were enamored with Rosanna Arquette and Madonna in “Desperately Seeking Susan” and Sarah Jessica Parker and Helen Hunt in “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.”
Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of “The Color Purple” and Woody Allen’s fantasy romance “The Purple Rose of Cairo” were hits both with critics and film fanatics in general. Sydney Pollack’s “Out of Africa” would be chosen as the best picture of the year at the Oscars, where Peter Weir’s “Witness” and Peter Bogdanovich’s “Mask” also were relevant.
Anjelica Huston would win best supporting actress for her father John Huston’s film “Prizzi’s Honor.” Japanese film legend Akira Kurosawa’s war epic “Ran” would be chosen as the best foreign film of 1985. Probably the most underrated movie to come out in ’85 is John Schlesinger’s “The Falcon and the Snowman,” starring Timothy Hutton and Sean Penn as two rookie spies with drug problems.
It’s hard to pick which films will be classics and which will become obscure upon first release, but it’s not hard to recognize quality filmmaking. These are a few of the most memorable movies from 30 years ago, and now we wait and guess which of this year’s releases will be remembered 30 years from now.
mbianco@durangoherald.com. Megan Bianco is a movie reviewer and also contributes other entertainment-related features and articles.
