The 5 Best (& 5 Worst) ’80s Thrillers

The revolution of the “New Hollywood” movement proved to be short-lived as Spielberg’s creation of the summer blockbuster with 1975’s Jaws set off a chain reaction that led to studios dominating the ‘80s with flashy, lightweight fare devoid of artistic merit — a climate that didn’t do the thriller genre many favors. Edge-of-your-seat thrill rides were few and far between throughout the decade.

Still, as with any decade, no matter how many stinkers were getting produced by the Hollywood studio system, there were also plenty of great movies getting made. Some of the best and worst thrillers were released in the 1980s.

10 Best: Dead Calm (1989)

Sam Neill and Nicole Kidman’s tranquil seabound vacation takes a sinister turn when they pick up a man who’s lost at sea and might not be who he claims he is.

Orson Welles tried and failed to get his own adaptation of Dead Calm off the ground, but Phillip Noyce did a fine job of making up for it.

9 Worst: The Punisher (1989)

Although it didn’t reach U.S. theaters until 1991, the first film adaptation of Marvel’s Punisher comics was initially released in 1989, so it’s technically an ‘80s movie — and unfortunately, it’s one of the worst.

Dolph Lundgren playing indestructible crime-fighter Frank Castle sounds awesome on paper, but the movie’s interminably long and aimless action scenes don’t provide the grindhouse comic book thrills they promise.

8 Best: Thief (1981)

Michael Mann kicked off his directing career in style with Thief, a slick neo-noir starring James Caan in one of his all-time finest performances as a disillusioned safecracker.

In his stylish debut, Mann brings the streets of Chicago to life with rain-drenched, neon-lit settings and an iconic soundtrack by Tangerine Dream.

7 Worst: Cruising (1980)

William Friedkin is a terrific director of thrillers, exemplified by such masterpieces as The French Connection, but he missed the mark on Cruising. Al Pacino stars as a detective investigating a serial killer targeting gay men in New York’s underground S&M subculture.

The movie was wildly controversial for its damaging depiction of the gay community, and what’s worse is that it tries to have its cake and eat it too when treading in offensive territory.

6 Best: The Vanishing (1988)

Although it was botched by a dreadful American remake five years later, director George Sluizer’s Dutch thriller The Vanishing is a true masterpiece of the genre.

It weaves the story of a man’s three-year search for his kidnapped partner into an intricate structure, building toward a jaw-dropping twist.

5 Worst: Physical Evidence (1989)

Michael Crichton should’ve stuck to writing books instead of making movies (his awesome film adaptation of Westworld notwithstanding). When he got in the director’s chair to helm Physical Evidence, a thriller about an incriminated ex-cop trying to prove his innocence, he dropped the ball.

Despite a committed lead performance by Burt Reynolds, Crichton’s by-the-numbers directing style fails to provoke any excitement from the audience.

4 Best: First Blood (1982)

In its later installments, the Rambo franchise became characterized by record-breaking body counts and excessive graphic violence. However, the original movie, First Blood, was a small-scale thriller responding to the treatment of Vietnam War veterans. John Rambo finds out all his friends from ‘Nam are dead, then reaches his breaking point when he’s driven out of town by the local cops.

He escapes from the cops’ clutches and into the woods, where he relies on his survival instincts to fend for himself and evade capture. Sylvester Stallone has said that it’s not a political movie, but it has a lot to say about post-Vietnam attitudes toward soldiers and the effects of PTSD.

3 Worst: Raw Deal (1986)

Arnold Schwarzenegger can give surprisingly strong performances with the right role – i.e. an emotionless cyborg – but for every Terminator, the Austrian Oak has starred in a dozen crummy, generic shoot-‘em-ups.

1986’s Raw Deal falls into that category. It achieves the phenomenal feat of setting up the most simplistic plot imaginable and then bungling it along the way.

2 Best: Blow Out (1981)

Brian De Palma’s answers to Antonioni’s Blowup and Coppola’s The Conversation stars John Travolta as a sound effects recorder searching for the perfect scream for a horror movie he’s working on. He accidentally captures audio of an assassination involving a presidential candidate and becomes paranoid that he’s been wrapped up in a widespread conspiracy.

De Palma came up with the concept for Blow Out while he was shooting Dressed to Kill, another terrific ‘80s thriller that didn’t quite make this list. Blow Out is arguably the director’s masterpiece, and one of Quentin Tarantino’s favorite movies.

1 Worst: Death Wish 4: The Crackdown (1987)

Putting Death Wish protagonist Paul Kersey in a premise like Yojimbo or A Fistful of Dollars, playing two street gangs against each other, was a great idea for the third sequel to the classic vigilante thriller. Charles Bronson just looks exhausted by the fourth go-around.

However, in execution, Death Wish 4 is just as needlessly violent and preachy as the other sequels, failing to recapture the visceral, cathartic thrills of the original.

About The Author

Ben Sherlock
(3465 Articles Published)

Ben Sherlock is a writer, comedian, independent filmmaker, and Burt Reynolds enthusiast. He writes lists for Screen Rant and features and reviews for Game Rant. He’s currently in pre-production on his first feature (and has been for a while, because filmmaking is expensive). You can catch him performing standup at odd pubs around the UK that will give him stage time. Previously, he wrote for Taste of Cinema, Comic Book Resources, and BabbleTop.

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