Try Your Hand at This Totally Tubular '80s Movies Quiz

“Airplane!” parodied the disaster movie genre, taking its plot from the 1957 TV movie “Zero Hour!” The film is full of surreal humor, visual gags, and slapstick comedy, and was a huge success, raking in $171 million worldwide. Today, “Airplane!” is revered as one of the funniest films ever made and was selected for inclusion in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.

“Do the Right Thing” is set in a poor Brooklyn neighborhood over the course of one blisteringly hot day. In the film, director Spike Lee explores racial tensions and uses the elevated temperature as a metaphor. Lee commissioned Public Enemy to write “Fight the Power” for the film, and it went on to become a hit in its own right. The song hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Rap Songs chart and remained there for six weeks.

Ridley Scott’s “Blade Runner” was released in 1982 and starred Harrison Ford and Rutger Hauer. The script was loosely based on Philip K. Dick’s “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” — although Scott reportedly never read the book. Dick was unhappy with the original script but came around after David Webb Peoples rewrote it. Unfortunately, Dick never saw it come to fruition as he died before the film was complete.

“Working Girl” (1988) caught the zeitgeist as millions of women entered the workforce during the 1980s. Melanie Griffith played the role of Tess McGill, a secretary from Staten Island who works her way to the top of the corporate ladder by emulating and stealing the job of her boss (Sigourney Weaver) while she is off work sick. Griffith went on to garner an Oscar nomination for the part.

1988’s “Die Hard” starred Bruce Willis as John McClane, a detective who becomes entangled in a terrorist hijacking of a Los Angeles skyscraper. Alan Rickman plays the dastardly Hans Gruber, who is intent on stealing the $640 million in untraceable bearer bonds stored in the building’s vault. The film is often praised — and also highly debated — as one of the greatest Christmas films of all time.

In the 1984 comedy “Ghostbusters,” the team drives the Ecto-1 while fighting “something strange in the neighborhood.” The vehicle was a 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor ambulance, and in the original script, the car was supposed to be painted black; they ended up keeping it white to make it easier to see during night scenes.

When originally casting the titular character for “Beetlejuice” (1988), director Tim Burton suggested 63-year-old Sammy Davis Jr. Producer David Geffen was not convinced and instead put forward Michael Keaton, who went on to make the role his own. The comedy horror movie was a huge hit with audiences, grossing more than $74 million. Burton would go on to work with Keaton again in “Batman” (1989).

The 1985 John Hughes movie “The Breakfast Club” centers around five teens thrown together during a Saturday morning detention. Tasked with writing a 1,000-word essay on “who they think they are,” nerd Brian rails against high school stereotypes and writes, “Each one of us is a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, and a criminal. Does that answer your question?”

“Raiders of the Lost Ark” was released in 1981 and became that year’s highest-grossing movie. In it, we are introduced to the dashing archaeologist Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) and learn that he has only one fear — snakes. For the scene in which Jones finds the Ark covered in snakes, Spielberg used an astonishing 10,000 asps to create the desired effect.

Dance had been banned in Elmore City, Oklahoma, since the town's 1898 incorporation, but in 1981, high school students petitioned the city council to allow them to hold a prom. The kids eked out a 3-2 vote, making headlines around the world and inspiring the 1984 musical drama "Footloose." The town now capitalizes on its stodgy past by hosting an annual Footloose Festival.

According to a resurfaced memo, studio boss Sid Sheinberg loved Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale's creative sci-fi script about time travel but apparently felt the title left "much to be desired." His suggestion? "Space Man From Pluto." Fortunately for the filmmakers, producer Steven Spielberg shut that down, and the movie's original, timeless title — "Back to the Future" — was allowed to stand.

While speaking to Chunk on the phone, a police officer reminds the eccentric adolescent that he once told a story about "little creatures that multiply when you pour water on them." "Gremlins" fans immediately recognized this as a reference to that zany cult classic, which, like "The Goonies," was written by Chris Columbus; further connecting the two films is Corey Feldman, who appeared in both.

Although Akeem (Eddie Murphy) is a wealthy prince from the (fictional) African nation of Zamunda, he pretends to be an unassuming student in an attempt to find love. As part of that ruse, he gets a job at a McDonald's knockoff called McDowell's. Fun fact: A pop-up version of McDowell's opened in New Jersey as part of a promotion for "Coming 2 America," the 2021 sequel to the 1988 comedy.

The producers of the 1986 action flick "Top Gun" had a need for speed — specifically, speedy fighter jets. Fortunately for them, the Pentagon agreed to let the filmmakers use actual military equipment, as long as the movie, which starred Tom Cruise, portrayed the Navy in a positive light. The result was a box office hit that helped boost recruitment numbers and confirmed Cruise as a superstar.

John Hughes gave us some of the most iconic films of the 1980s — but not always as a director. Although he wrote the screenplays for all four of these movies, he directed just three of them: "Sixteen Candles" (1984), "The Breakfast Club" (1985), and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" (1986). Howard Deutch directed "Pretty in Pink" (1986), as well as another Hughes script, "Some Kind of Wonderful" (1987).

The crane kick was crucial in Daniel taking down his rival, Johnny Lawrence, of the villainous Cobra Kai dojo, but it was possibly too devastating. According to rules from the USA National Karate-do Federation, the full-force kick was probably illegal and warranted a warning or a penalty.

"Big" stars Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia poured their hearts and souls into playing the massive floor piano during a visit to FAO Schwarz in Midtown Manhattan. The duo practiced the routine for several months so the scene could be shot without body doubles; Hanks likened the strenuous sessions to jumping rope for three- and- a- half hours at a time.

One of the most popular films of all time, "E.T." was an out-of-this-world marketing moment for Reese’s Pieces. Sales of the chocolate-and-peanut-butter candy, which had previously been lagging, skyrocketed within just two weeks of the movie's release. Director Steven Spielberg originally approached Mars about featuring M&Ms in the film, but they said no, letting a candy-coated opportunity melt right through their fingers.

The cult classic “Labyrinth” starred David Bowie as the creepy Goblin King who steals a baby and leaves the baby’s teenage sister (Jennifer Connelly) to rescue him. The film was directed by Jim Henson and included puppets from his Creature Shop. When released in 1986, it was considered a box-office flop, much to the consternation of Henson, but it subsequently became a fan favorite.

The second film in the original “Star Wars” trilogy, “The Empire Strikes Back,” debuted in theaters on May 21, 1980, following up on 1977’s “A New Hope.” The sequel follows Sith lord Darth Vader’s pursuit of Luke Skywalker, and culminates with one of the most shocking movie twists of all time. The beloved trilogy concluded in 1983 with “Return of the Jedi.”

The image of Lloyd Dobler (John Cusack) holding a boombox above his head in Cameron Crowe's 1989 romantic comedy "Say Anything…" is one of the most memorable moments in '80s cinema. The scene has been re-created countless times with different songs, but nothing compares to the original, which featured Lloyd blasting Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" outside Diane Court's (Ione Skye) bedroom window.