Which decade would you consider the best decade for film?

[Oscar Antonio M]

I would have to say the 70's with the Star Wars trilogy, Jaws and plenty of others that changed the way film was done at the time and it did great influence on films afterward the period.

But also the late 80's and early 90's as well, with the whole independent filmaking wave coming out with Spike Lee, Quentin Tarantino, Jim Jarmusch and Kevin Smith.

[MurDiddlyUrdler]

Easily the 1970s. I don't have time to list all the titles, but there's at least three or four true classic titles that came out each year in the '70s. Just look at the Academy Award Best Pictur nominees from 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Jaws, Barry Lyndon, Nashville, and Dog Day Afternoon. Awesome. Every year was like that.

[MooglePorn]

Most 70's films I watch are excellent, but I also have an affinity for the 90's because of my age... toss up!

[disclover]

I go along with the 1970's as well. Hard to believe a lot of those films were released by major studios: Five Easy Pieces, The Last Picture Show, Chinatown, Taxi Driver...these would have to be released independently today, if they were released at all. How things have changed. Even blockbuster releases were more diverse than they are today: Godfather and Godfather II, Jaws, Star Wars...the 1970's were truly a golden time for American filmmaking.

As a runner up, I'd say the late 1930's and early 1940's. Any period with Citizen Kane, Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz, and Renoir's Grand Illusion has to be up there as well.

[Notoriousaurus]

The 1980s were my favourite decade on pure entertainment value. Great movies were made during this time, excellent "for the family" movies, and freat franchises started and finished.

A few examples


The Abyss
Akira
Aliens
American Werewolf
Back To the Future
Batman
Blade Runner
Brazil
Buckaroo Banzai
CHERRY 2000
Die Hard
E.T.
The Evil Dead
Full Metal Jacket
Ghostbusters
Goonies
Gremlins
Heathers
Indiana Jones
Platoon
Princess Bride
Re-Animator
Robocop
Scarface
The Shining
Star Trek 2 & 4
Star Wars 5 & 6
The Terminator
Spinal Tap
The Cusack Films - Say Anything..., Better Off Dead..., Sure Thing
The Carpenter Films - The Fog, Christine, They Live, The Thing, Escape From New York...
The Lynch Films - The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet.
The Hughes Films - Ferris, Breakfast Club, Weird Science
The Horror Franchises - Freddy, Jason, Pinhead,

And Im sure I missed so many more...

[Marq]

The 70s. - Taxi Driver, Chinatown, Don;'t Look Now, Godfather, Halloween, etc etc. A "decade under the influence" indeed, the influence of great filmmakers that paved the way for the film vision of many of todays great filmmakers - Altman, Demme, and Scorsese influence PTA; blaxpoitation, foreign movies, Brian de Palma influenced Quentin, and it goes on and on.

But of course every decade has its share of brilliant movies. Looking at my personal Top 6 movies, I have two from the 60s, one from the 70s, one from the 80s, one from the 90s and one from the 00s...

There is not decade I don't like considering every year has a dozen movies I love to death...

[zwuncki]

to me 30´s and 40´s. the best movies where made during that time. and they were the most influencing one too

[Darksim]

I'm going with the 90's, kids. There's so many favorites from this decade, I just can't forget it. Fight Club, Usual Suspects, the historical Spielberg flicks, and the wave of Tarantino movies. Of course, with the 90's came plenty of shittyass movies, but you just can't deny the good ones.

Edit: I took out Memento, I thought it was a 1999 movie, my bad..

[MurDiddlyUrdler]

Originally Posted by Darksim

I'm going with the 90's, kids. There's so many favorites from this decade, I just can't forget it. Fight Club, Memento, Usual Suspects, the historical Spielberg flicks, and the wave of Tarantino movies. Of course, with the 90's came plenty of shittyass movies, but you just can't deny the good ones.

Memento was a 2000 movie that was released to most of the country and the world in 2001. Great flick and I like your '90s choices as well.

[Surf Monkey]

Toss up between the 30's and 40's. The 70's are a distant third.

[asphodel5]

I enjoy a variety of films from every decade, but I'm going to have to go with the 60s. Bergman was known and making strong films. Antonioni made some of his best work. The French new wave was going strong. Hitchcock made some fine films. Fellini really made his mark. Bunuel was working fast. Scorsese and the German new wave were just getting going. I'm not even mentioning all of the great actors and actresses that were still working or just starting in the 60s. These factors (and many more) built on the strongest elements of 20s-50s films and contributed to the great films that have followed.

[TylerD]

The 80's, hands down.

[Harro5]

Probably the 70s, as most have said, as there were so many monumentous films that changed the future of film.

The Godfather (how many mafia films have followed?)
Taxi Driver (truthful depiction of post-Vietnam life)
Star Wars (don't like it personally, but it started sci-fi)
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest (Jack Nicholson's best)
Jaws (scariest movie of its time)

The 90s had also good movies, but didn't shape film history as much. Very good films though:

Forrest Gump ("life is like a box of chocolates")
Titanic (doesn't seem as good now as it did then)
Schindler's List (please come out on DVD!!!)
American Beauty ('this is what Kevin Spacey looks like in a good film, kids' )
Braveheart (Hollywood + money + lots o' fighting = instant classic)
As Good As It Gets (a romantic comedy that actually won Oscars?)
Saving Private Ryan (the 90s were Tom Hanks)
Pulp Fiction (welcome to cult cinema)
Good Will Hunting (Ben Affleck in a good film...no? )

[SephirothClone]

1. 70's
2. 80's
3. 90's
4. 60's
5. 50's.

[Marq]

Originally Posted by Harro5

Taxi Driver (most truthful depiction of ganster life)

Clearly I've been watching a totally different movie called Taxi Driver all my life if this whatit was supposed to be about.

The absense of any gangsters in the movie kinda makes this description confusing.... and that's its about one man's loneliness and insanity...

Star Wars (......it started sci-fi)

Whaaa?

[retroboy]

Yeah, what Marq said.

For me it's in the Seventies. Look at all the great directors from this decade: Coppola, Scorsese, Spielberg, Lumet, Bogdonavich, DePalma, Roeg, Forman, Malick, Mazursky, Cassavettes, Kubrick, Friedkin, Altman, Polanski, Pakula, Allen, Lucas, etc. Most of their best work is made in this period. And all this from (mostly) major studios--maybe mainstream audiences back then were more sophisticated?

Horror films were amazing during the Seventies: The Exorcist, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Hills Have Eyes, Dawn of the Dead, The Last House on the Left, Suspiria, Jaws, Halloween, Black Christmas, Carrie, Alien, etc.

My least favorite decade would be the Eighties. Many of the aforementioned directors would struggle with films made in that era. The rise of the action genre, raunchy sex comedies and slasher flicks, IMHO, seemed to suck the life out of creativity at the major studios (not that weren't bright spots here and there).

1999 was also a great year for studio films--it was like the Seventies again, however brief.

[larphillips]

Number 1 - 1970's - defined what it was to be an independent filmmaker, defined what a true 'blockbuster' was, and ushered in a wave of talent that will influence film and filmmakers for a long, long time.

Number 2 - 1930's - The rising flood of facism and communism created a major flood of filmmaking talent into the United States and the rapidly growing Hollywood. To have such a collection of talent in place to collaborate and create, and the greatest infrastructure of movie-making capacity in one place created amazing works of genius and daring.

Number 3 - 1950's - Freed from the constraints of World War 2, Hollywood ushered in another golden age. From the great noir classics, to the rise of technicolor epics, few eras spoke in so many ways to so many people.

Number 4 - 1990's - The bloat of the 80's and the failure of so many popcorn movie factories allowed a great number of the new wave of independents to find their voices and establish their footing.

[FilmFanSea]

Based on the number of sheer masterpieces released, I would have a hard time choosing between the 1950s and the 1960s. Evidence:

1950s
Bergman: Wild Strawberries, The Seventh Seal
Bresson: Diary of a Country Priest, A Man Escaped, Pickpocket
Buñuel: Los Olvidados, El
Donen & Kelly: Singin' in the Rain
Fellini: La Strada, Nights of Cabiria
Ford: The Searchers
Godard: Breathless
Hitchcock: Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest
Kazan: Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront
Kurosawa: Rashomon, Ikiru, Seven Samurai
Laughton: Night of the Hunter
Mizoguchi: Life of Oharu, Sansho the Bailiff, Ugetsu
Ophuls: Earrings of Madame de...
Ozu: Tokyo Story
Nick Ray: Rebel Without a Cause
Satyajit Ray: Apu Trilogy
Renoir: The River
Tati: Mr. Hulot's Holiday
Truffaut: 400 Blows
Wajda: Ashes and Diamonds, Kanal
Welles: Touch of Evil
Wilder: Sunset Blvd., Some Like It Hot

1960s
Antonioni: L'Avventura, L'eclisse
Bergman: Winter Light, Persona, Shame
Bresson: Au Hasard Balthazar
Buñuel: Viridiana, Belle de jour
Fellini: La Dolce vita, 8½
Godard: Vivre sa vie, Le Mépris, Pierrot le fou
Hitchcock: Psycho
Kubrick: Dr. Strangelove
Lean: Lawrence of Arabia
Marker: La Jetée
Melville: Le Samourai
Ozu: Autumn Afternoon
Peckinpah: The Wild Bunch
Penn: Bonnie and Clyde
Polanski: Rosemary's Baby
Tarkovsky: Andrei Rublev
Tati: Playtime
Teshigahara: Woman in the Dunes
Truffaut: Jules and Jim, Shoot the Piano Player
Visconti: The Leopard
Welles: Chimes at Midnight


I would probably give the nod to the 1950s. Although there have been many great films in the last 20+ years, the overall quality of the cinema has fallen off greatly.

[EnriqueH]

For me, it's easily the 1970s since the vast majority of my top 10 favorite movies of all time are made up of 70s films. Here's my top 10:

1) Star Wars
2) Superman II
3) Pulp Fiction
4) Enter the Dragon
5) The Godfather
6) Jaws
7) The French Connection
8) Close Encounters of the Third Kind
9) Superman: The Movie
10) Saturday Night Fever

EnriqueH

[Riddick]

I don't know about that

nice list but you left out Robert Wise 50's "The Day the Earth Stood Still"

But Wise cranked out 3 great movies in the 60's and 2 of them could easily be in the top ten on anyones list

West Side Story, and his 2 best efforts

The Sound of Music

and The Sand Pebbles

I put the 70's 1st, 40's 2nd, 90's 3rd, and 60's 4th

[PorkChopXpress]

I would have to go with the 70's for all the reasons listed above. It was truly a golden era for cinema and creativity, most notably in America.

I also have to mention the 50's and 60's, which were great eras for world cinema. It really is hard to decide which was a more significant decade for film between the two. Looking at FilmFanSea's list of films from the 50's and 60's, it really is remarkable to see the sheer volume of classic influential films that came from that time period. These two decades definitely deserve some recognition.

[Darksim]

EnriqueH, Pulp Fiction was made in 1995, not in the seventies. Tarantino wouldv'e had to be ten years old if he made it then, lol. Pulp Fiction sure does feel like a seventies movie though, doesn't it?

[SilentBob]

I think i would have to go with the 90's and the 80's for me. I think the age of CGI was a great enovation for movies and brought a new magic to them.So here is my list of great movies

80's

Pink Floyd The Wall
An American tail
Back to the Future
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
The Princess Bride
Die Hard
The Terminator
The Never Ending Story
Aliens
Batman



90's

Toy Story 1&2 (all Pixar Movies)
Silence of the Lambs
Jurassic Park
Amelie
Aladdin
The Lion King
Terminator 2
GoldenEye
Saving Private Ryan
Princess Mononoke



just to name a few

[Soggy Bagel's Revenge!]

Originally Posted by Harro5

Star Wars (don't like it personally, but it started sci-fi)

Seriously, what ARE you talking about? Even if I considered it a good film, I'd never be so delusional as to think that the entire genre of science fiction, which existed before the medium of film did, was created by it

I'll go with the 1970s as well, with an honorable mention to the 60s. The 60s were really the beginning of the liberation of film, allowing all of the wonderful work of the 1970s to exist. In the 70s, however, we got Dario Argento doing his most amazing work, and that's reason enough for me to give that decade my vote

[MooglePorn]

Originally Posted by Soggy Bagel's Revenge!

Seriously, what ARE you talking about? Even if I considered it a good film, I'd never be so delusional as to think that the entire genre of science fiction, which existed before the medium of film did, was created by it :roll eyes:

It's quite possible he meant it started a sci-fi trend, not the genre itself...

[Notoriousaurus]

Originally Posted by Darksim

EnriqueH, Pulp Fiction was made in 1995, not in the seventies. Tarantino wouldv'e had to be ten years old if he made it then, lol. Pulp Fiction sure does feel like a seventies movie though, doesn't it?

For that matter Superman II came out in 1980

[FurryHumanBeing]

Yeah I'm going w/ the 70's. It was by far the best period for both film & music IMO