The 1950s was an exciting time in the United States. With WWII over, America was booming as more people had more financial freedom. The Golden Age of Television began, and a post-war world meant unlimited possibilities. New technologies emerged people started going out more, and pop culture was primed for a resurgence. Music stars like Elvis and Chuck Berry became immensely popular, and movie stars like James Dean, John Wayne, and Marilyn Monroe rose to fame.
Those movie stars also became stylish fashion icons, helping to popularize things like poodle skirts, leather jackets, and cat-eye sunglasses. Over the last seven decades, many movies have attempted to depict the cool style of the 1950s, and some have been successful in their pursuit of capturing the feeling, excitement, and energy of the era. These are the best stylish movies set in the '50s.
10 Rebel Without A Cause
James Dean is an icon of the 1950s. He was the epitome of cool, wearing leather jackets and taking on tough guy roles. Women loved him back then and men wanted to be just like him Dean's legacy was cemented with the 1954 film Rebel Without a Cause, directed by Nicolas Roy. In the movie, Dean plays rebellious teenager Jim Stark who moves to a new town looking for a fresh start. Instead, he meets a girl named Judy (Natalie Wood), who is already taken by a bully named Buzz (Corey Allen).
Rebel Without a Cause is a great 50s movie that represents the male self-image of the time. It's all about machismo - looking cool while fighting for the girl that you want to date. Dean was also a fashion icon, rocking leather jackets and skin-tight jeans whenever possible. Rebel Without a Cause is his most well-known film, and it was nominated for three Academy Awards. It's worth revisiting as it currently holds a 93% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
9 Grease
Grease is the most well-known movie musical set in the 1950s. When Danny (John Travolta) meets Australian tourist Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) in the summer of 1958, the two quickly fall in love but fear they won't see each other again after the school break is over. Sandy's parents decide to stay in the USA and enroll her in the same high school as Danny. The two continue their relationship despite their allegiance to their greaser gangs: Danny to the T-Birds and Sandy to the Pink Ladies.
Although the film came out in 1978, Grease is set in the 50s and nails everything great about the 50s style. Danny and the T-Birds wear leather jackets and have ducktail hairstyles, while Sandy and the Pink Ladies wear flared poodle skirts and short-sleeve sweaters. Grease also captures the feeling of the 50s, the post-war era when young people finally had fun and felt carefree.
8 L.A. Confidential
When it comes to the 1950s noir esthetic, the 1997 film L.A. Confidential hits a home run. The movie is based on the 1990 novel of the same name by James Ellroy. It's about a group of police officers (played by Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey, and Russell Crowe) who are tasked with solving a murder at a Los Angeles coffee shop. Each one has their own motives and nobody is sure who they can trust.
The style, corruption, and rise of Hollywood in the 50s are featured prominently in L.A. Confidential. Kim Basinger channels her best Marilyn Monroe look as a prostitute named Lynn Bracken who is meant to look like a celebrity. Overall, the cinematography of the movie makes it feel like it came out of the '50s even though it was released in the late nineties. Many critics still consider L.A. Confidential to be a perfect noir film 25 years later.
7 Shutter Island
Based on the novel by Dennis Lehane, Martin Scorsese's 2010 movie Shutter Island is another neo-noir mystery set in the 1950s. Leonardo DiCaprio plays US Marshal Teddy Daniels, an agent who is called in to solve the mystery of a patient missing from a psychiatric prison. With the help of his new partner Chuck (Mark Ruffalo), Teddy must follow the clues and figure out what happened before his mind falls into delusion.
The style of the 50s is displayed front and enter in Shutter Island as it's set in 1954. Costumes are pitch perfect as the two men wear overcoats, fedora hats, and slick suits and ties. Scorsese follows the noir handbook by using dim lighting, bleak cinematography, and tense music to pull the viewer into his 50s world of corruption and deceit.
6 Pleasantville
It's hard to picture a movie that does a better job of showing the idealism of the 1950s than 1998's Pleasantville. Tobey Maguire is David, a high school kid who loves to watch '50s TV sitcoms. He's devoted to the television, so when a TV technician (Don Knotts) sucks him into a black-and-white show, he's pleasantly surprised. His sister Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon) is zapped in with him, but she's not as impressed and yearns to get back to reality.
The show that David and Jennifer are trapped in is a typical '50s comedy with era-appropriate costumes, corny dialogue, and all-too-positive characters. But the duo feels that living in a TV show is drab, and welcomes any chance to introduce color (literally and metaphorically) into their lives. Some fans consider Pleasantville to be Tobey Maguire's best movie.
5 Ed Wood
Ed Wood came out in 1994, but it's set primarily in the 1950s. It's about eccentric director Ed Wood (Johnny Depp) who made oddball cult classics of the era like Bride of the Monster and Planet 9 from Outer Space. Depp was praised for his portrayal of Wood, and it's considered one of his best early roles. The movie focuses on Wood's relationship with famed actor Bela Legosi (Martin Landau), his connections to wealthy financiers, and his romance with Kathy O'Hara (Patricia Arquette).
Director Tim Burton wisely made the film in black-and-white, which instantly gives it a look and feel very reminiscent of the '50s. It's full of beautiful visuals and the screenplay is exaggerated to great effect. By focusing on the five most exciting years of Wood's life, Burton can give his subject a surreal optimist with real hopes, fears, and dreams - the emotions that epitomized the 1950s.
4 Asteroid City
The most recent entry on the list is Wes Anderson's Asteroid City, released in 2023. The film follows a playwright as he travels with his family to attend a junior stargazer convention in the middle of the desert. The film is set in 1955 and uses bland pastels, quirky characters, and Anderson's signature blunt dialogue to set the scene.
Asteroid City of course utilizes Anderon's style, which is well established through movies like The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic, and The Grand Budapest Hotel, to name a few. It also captures the movement of science fiction in the 1950s when there was great optimism toward space travel but also trepidation over the power of the atomic bomb. Asteroid City is a great movie, even if the ending needs some explanation.
3 The Godfather
Marlon Brando stars as mafia boss Don Vito Corleone in Francis Ford Coppola's epic crime drama The Godfather. Set in 1945, the movie traces the rise of Don's son Michael (Al Pacino) from a hesitant young man to a vicious mob boss by 1955. James Caan, Robert Duvall, and Diane Keaton also star. The Godfather captures the gritty underworld of New York City in the 1940s and 1950s, when corruption was rampant, cops were dirty, and the mafia ruled the streets.
The Godfather is considered a masterpiece of cinema and spawned two sequels. Everything from the makeup to the music in the movie is spot on, which is why it was nominated for 11 Academy Awards. Gangster movies existed before The Godfather, but it was the mob movie that brought the genre to the mainstream with its cool aesthetic and style.
2 Goodfellas
Goodfellas is another great mob movie set in the 1950s. The film came out in 1990, and although it wasn't related to The Godfather, it definitely built on its sense of style and swagger. Goodfellas featured the late Ray Liotta as Henry Hill, a mob boss who rose to power from 1955 to 1980.
Once again, veteran actor Robert De Niro had a major role in a mob film. He played James "Jimmy" Conway, a gangster and associate of Hill's boss. Joe Pesci stars as Tommy DeVito, a fellow juvenile delinquent. Directed by Martin Scorsese, Goodfellas features fast-paced editing, strong cinematography, and witty dialogue that contribute to its signature style.
1 Walk the Line
In James Mangold's biopic Walk the Line, Joaquin Phoenix is country music legend Johnny Cash. Phoenix does everything he can to get the performance just right, nailing Cash's iconic attitude, voice, and appearance. Phoenix even learned to play guitar just for the role. Reese Witherspoon plays Cash's loving (but later estranged) wife June Carter Cash, and it's one of her best performances as well.
There are many moments in Walk the Line when viewers can cut the tension with a knife. For instance, when Cash first performs his hit "Folsom Prison Blues" for a record executive, it's like everyone in the room is on pins and needles. Walk the Line hits all the right notes, and is a fittingly stylish portrayal of the trials and tribulations of The Man In Black.
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