When it comes to the Oscars’ Best Pictures, the 1980s sit in a strange spot. People often call it one of the weaker stretches for Best Picture winners, but it makes more sense when you look at what the decade is wedged between. The 1970s include the first two “The Godfather” movies and “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” The films feel shaped by the aftermath of constant war and government scandals, questioning power and exposing broken systems. Then, the 1990s swing in the opposite direction, bringing back large-scale spectacle and emotional storytelling that feels built for the biggest possible screen, with films like “Titanic” and “Braveheart” at the forefront.

The ‘80s, though, don’t land with one clear identity. It feels like a middle period where Hollywood is still figuring itself out. The ‘70s had grit and distrust in institutions. The ‘90s brought in spectacle and scale, movies that feel built to fill a screen. Currently, the 2020s, lean into identity; who gets to tell stories and whose perspective is centered.

That’s what stuck with me. There isn’t an obvious throughline or clear theme to point at when it comes to the ‘80s. So I went back through some of the decade’s most prestigious flicks, trying to see if something consistent shows up across them, or if the reputation it gets is actually deserved.

Ordinary People (1980)
“Ordinary People” is the first directorial effort of acting legend Robert Redford, whom I knew best from “All the President’s Men,” which they showed us at the end of AP U.S. History. It is an adaptation of Judith Guest’s 1976 novel of the same name. The story is simple: a family of four becomes a family of three, struggling to cope with grief following the death of their eldest son in a boating accident. The film earned Timothy Hutton a much-deserved Supporting Actor statuette for his debut performance, making him the youngest to ever win the award.

This film holds up surprisingly well. When you have performances of this depth guided by a script this powerful, how could it grow old? “The Hunger Games’” Donald Sutherland, “Dick Van Dyke” star Mary Tyler Moore and Hutton give tragic performances, and play roles that no one else could attempt. Redford, as a director, is surprisingly competent. The editing is tight, and the low color contrast hits. There is a quiet atmosphere surrounding this movie, because people don’t like to be loud about their grief. It’s a different movie than what the Oscars usually give the biggest award to, but it is a perfect way to open up the decade.

Terms of Endearment (1983)
James L. Brooks, or surprisingly, one of the guys who produces “The Simpsons,” delivers another great example of a powerful debut in filmmaking. Similar to “Ordinary People,” “Terms of Endearment” takes a trip in the world of a family that’s falling apart. The film earned powerhouses Shirley MacLaine and Jack Nicholson Oscars for Best Actress and Supporting Actor, respectively. Simply put, it follows a tumultuous 30-year relationship between a mother, Aurora Greenway, and her daughter, Emma.

Watching “Terms of Endearment” for the first time raises the question: “Who is Debra Winger and why haven’t I seen her in anything else?” She’s too good to ignore, and her snub for the Best Actress award to her co-star MacLaine is probably one of the hardest Oscar losses to digest for me. MacLaine is great, Winger sticks with you.

“Terms of Endearment” is about change, or really, the lack thereof. Years go by, lives shift, but people stay stuck in the same patterns. The same fights, habits and ways of loving each other that never fully line up. No matter how much time passes, you don’t really escape who you are at your core, and the film keeps circling back to that idea until it hurts a little.

Rain Man (1988)
“Rain Man” is Barry Levinson’s magnum opus sixth feature film, and it follows a selfish car dealer named Charlie (Tom Cruise) who finds out that his estranged, deceased father left a $3 million fortune to his autistic savant brother named Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), whom Charlie never knew existed.

The film leans into the road trip movie formula, which honestly, works in its favor. There’s a built-in familiarity to it, you know where each plot point sits and where it’s headed. “Rain Man” overcomes that reliance on the familiar with these outstanding performances that keep it from feeling stale. Hoffman earned his Best Actor trophy for it, but Cruise sticks out to me.

We see Cruise playing the worst man on earth. There’s been a lot of talk lately about when Cruise was at his peak, especially with his upcoming film “Digger.” Although the ‘90s see Cruise at his most profitable with “Mission Impossible” being an obvious highlight, I think the ‘80s is where he shines the most. “The Color of Money” and “Top Gun” show the range, but this feels real. A lot of that comes from how he plays off Hoffman. Their back-and-forth never feels forced, and you can actually see the shift in Charlie as it happens, little by little.

I expected “Rain Man” to lean into easy emotion and exploit mental disability to pull a reaction. It doesn’t. It plays things straight and ends up feeling sincere. The story stays grounded in the relationship, and by the end, it earns its sentiment. It’s simple, but it works, and it’s a reminder that those familiar formulas stick around for a reason.

Platoon (1986)
Oliver Stone’s “Platoon” follows a naive young volunteer in 1967 Vietnam who slowly loses whatever idea he had of what war was supposed to be. I’ve loved this movie since the first time I watched it, and for some odd reason, it makes me feel like a kid again. Not exactly the reaction you’d expect from a Vietnam War film, but it sticks.

Before this, you had “Apocalypse Now” and “The Deer Hunter,” both showing the chaos and cost of war on a soldier. “Platoon” takes that a step further. Stone, who served on the frontlines of the Vietnam War himself, focuses on what war does to a person from the inside out, how it strips them down in a fight most of them don’t fully understand.

The script is raw, beautiful and brilliantly executed. From the moment they land on the Saigon combat zone, it’s clear what the job is: stay alive, get through the day, repeat. And that thin line between good and evil is exactly where Stone builds the story. These men are stuck in it, running on fear, exhaustion and instinct. That constant tension between who they were and what they’re becoming is what gives the film its weight, and why it still hits as hard as it did back then.

Amadeus (1984)
“Amadeus” is one of those movies that just clicks right away. If we’re talking about films that make you feel like a kid again, this is near the top. It felt like a Disney movie come to life. The film doesn’t play like a dry, beige biopic about Mozart; instead, there’s energy in every scene, like you can feel Mozart’s youth pushing through the screen. It almost feels like it should end with happily ever after. There’s a reason it ranks so high on so many Oscar lists. It feels closer to what the ‘90s would lean into later: bigger, more alive, more cinematic.

Beyond the spectacle and all the historical inaccuracies, the movie is something way more interesting. It’s about talent, jealousy and what it means to actually be “great.” The characters of Antonio Salieri and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart could not have more contrast. Salieri is devoted to his craft, while Mozart is unbearable and can create genius art without even trying. Salieri can’t make sense of this contrast, so he turns to religion. If God gave Mozart that kind of talent, then what does that say about everyone else? About him? That question eats at him all 161 minutes of the film. It turns into resentment, then obsession. The movie keeps circling that idea: What separates a great artist from everyone else, and does effort even matter when raw talent walks in the room? It’s gripping the whole way through.

Looking across these films, the ‘80s start to make a little more sense. They aren’t as unified as the decades around them, but they aren’t empty. If anything, they keep circling the same idea from different angles: people trying to hold themselves together when something bigger than them breaks their world. Grief in “Ordinary People,” time and change in “Terms of Endearment,” connection in “Rain Man,” morality in “Platoon” and obsession in “Amadeus” — they all feel different when they’re asking similar questions throughout.

So no, the ‘80s don’t have the clean identity of the ‘70s or the spectacle of the ‘90s. But that doesn’t mean the decade deserves the hate it gets. It feels more like a transition period where Hollywood turns inward, focusing less on systems or scale and more on people. Messy or inconsistent, but still worth paying attention to.