Every year, the Academy Awards represent the pinnacle of filmmaking esteem. The ceremony is the peak of the annual awards season, and while viewership has dwindled in recent years, the award itself still remains the highest honor that one can receive in the American film industry. While the Oscars are intended to honor the best and most important films of every year, the Academy doesn’t always get it right. Sometimes films that should be massive award-winners are entirely shut out without as much as a nomination, while other times the films that end up winning Best Picture leave audiences and critics alike scratching their heads.
Over the last month or so, we have been looking back on the films that have won Best Picture, decade by decade, through the lens of Rotten Tomatoes. While the review aggregating site certainly has issues, and one may justifiably argue that audiences should not base their decisions and thoughts regarding a movie upon the site, it does offer a glance into what the general view of a movie may be. We’ve already covered the Best Picture winners from the 2010s, 2000s and 1990s, so naturally that leads us to the 1980s for the next list.
This group of winners is an interesting bunch, because, while a lot of truly iconic and influential films were released in the 1980s, they aren’t necessarily represented in the Best Picture winners of the decade. Don’t expect to see films like Raging Bull, The Shining or Blade Runner on this list. With that said, here are the 10 films of the ‘80s that won Best Picture, ranked by Rotten Tomatoes:
10 Out of Africa (1985) – 62%
Out of Africa
- Release Date
- December 20, 1985
- Director
- Sydney Pollack
- Cast
- Meryl Streep, Robert Redford, Klaus Maria Brandauer, Michael Kitchen, Malick Bowens, Joseph Thiaka
- Rating
- PG
- Runtime
- 150
- Main Genre
- Biography
First on the list is 1985’s Out of Africa, an extended romance film starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford, which won Best Picture in addition to six other Oscars, with a total of 11 nominations. This is a prime example of a movie winning Best Picture, only for its win to become increasingly confusing over the years. Not that Out of Africa is a bad movie, it’s just generally thought to be a fine movie that doesn’t really provide anything special.
Streep and Redford have continually been praised for their performances, and John Barry provides an excellent original score. But it’s hard to see how this movie beat out other films like The Color Purple, Witness and Akira Kurosawa’s Ran for Best Picture. That mindset is clear to see in the film’s RT score, as it holds a mere 62% approval rating based on 90 reviews.
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9 Terms of Endearment (1983) – 81%
Next on the list, we see a significant upward jump in the RT score with 1983’s Terms of Endearment. The film holds an 81% approval rating, based on 108 reviews. It also sets a fun trend for the rest of this list, as the rest of these Best Picture winners from the ‘80s all have critic scores that land in the '80s. Terms of Endearment is directed by James L. Brooks, and it stars the likes of Debra Winger, Shirley MacLaine, Jack Nicholson, Jeff Daniels, John Lithgow and Danny DeVito.
The story is an extended look at the relationship between a mother and daughter, showcasing how they each evolve over the course of 30 years. It was a major award-winner that year, as it was nominated for 11 Oscars, ultimately winning five of them. In addition to Best Picture, Brooks won for Best Director and Best Screenplay, while MacLaine won Best Actress and Nicholson won Best Supporting Actor.
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8 Chariots of Fire (1981) – 83%
Chariots of Fire
- Release Date
- May 15, 1981
- Director
- Hugh Hudson
- Cast
- Nicholas Farrell, Nigel Havers, Ian Charleson, Ben Cross, Daniel Gerroll, Ian Holm
- Rating
- PG
- Runtime
- 123
- Main Genre
- Drama
The second film of the ‘80s to win Best Picture was 1981’s Chariots of Fire, directed by Hugh Hudson. The film is in rare company, as it is one of only three sports-based movies to ever win the top award at the Oscars, with the other two being 1976’s Rocky and 2004’s Million Dollar Baby. The film won three other Oscars that year, including one for the exceptional score for the famed composer Vangelis – which would be the only Oscar win of his career. Today, the film holds an 83% approval based on 115 reviews.
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7 Driving Miss Daisy (1989) – 85%
The final Best Picture winner of the decade was Driving Miss Daisy, which took home the top honor in early 1990. This has become a somewhat controversial win over the last few decades, as Driving Miss Daisy has faced an increasing amount of criticism for its overly simplistic depiction of race in America. In that manner, the film has a distinct similarity to 2018’s Green Book, which has drawn similar criticisms. Additionally, Driving Miss Daisy won the award in a year in which films like Dead Poets Society and Field of Dreams were nominated, and Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing was omitted from the category altogether.
In a strange echo of time, Green Book also beat out Lee’s BlacKkKlansman for the award in 2019. Thirty years prior, Driving Miss Daisy was nominated for nine Oscars, of which it won four. Despite the criticisms against it, the film still has a solid 85% approval rating based on 105 reviews.
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6 The Last Emperor (1987) – 86%
The 60th Academy Awards, which recognized films from 1987, featured one of the best lineups of nominees of any year in the ‘80s. While Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor won Best Picture, other films nominated that year included Broadcast News, Fatal Attraction, Wall Street, The Untouchables, Full Metal Jacket, Empire of the Sun, The Princess Bride and Good Morning, Vietnam. Even further, in the technical categories, many classic blockbusters like Predator, RoboCop and Lethal Weapon were also nominated.
This vast array of incredible nominees only highlights the astounding fact that The Last Emperor was nominated for nine Oscars, and it left the evening having won every single one of them. From Best Picture to Best Director and Best Cinematography to Best Sound, The Last Emperor swept the Oscars that year. It still stands tall today as a fantastic work by Bertolucci. Based on 124 reviews, it currently holds an 86% approval rating.
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5 Rain Man (1988) – 88%
UA
One of the most iconic Best Picture winners of the ‘80s is undoubtedly Barry Levinson’s Rain Man from 1988. The film co-starred Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman, and it has become one of the most famous and beloved films of both actors’ careers. With 137 reviews gathered, the film currently holds an 88% approval rating. In 1989, the film was nominated for eight Oscars, ultimately winning half of them.
One of those nominations was the first for composer Hans Zimmer, though he wouldn’t win his first Oscar until 1995's The Lion King. The three other awards Rain Man did win, however, were Best Director, Best Actor (for Hoffman), and Best Screenplay. Other films that were nominated that year included Mississippi Burning, The Last Temptation of Christ, Big and Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.
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4 Ordinary People (1980) – 89%
The very first film of the 1980s to win Best Picture was Ordinary People, the directorial debut of the outstanding Robert Redford. Despite his prominent work as an actor, Redford does not actually appear in the film, as the cast instead consists of Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch, Timothy Hutton and many more. It was nominated for six Oscars, of which it ended up winning four – Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor (Hutton), and Best Screenplay. The film holds an 89% approval rating based on 104 reviews.
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3 Gandhi (1982) – 89%
gandhi
- Release Date
- November 30, 1982
- Director
- Richard Attenborough
- Cast
- Ben Kingsley, Candice Bergen, Edward Fox, John Gielgud, Trevor Howard, John Mills
- Rating
- PG
- Runtime
- 188
- Main Genre
- Biography
Ordinary People is not the only film with an 89% approval rating on this list; in fact, the final four entries on this list all fall at 89% scores on RT. The Best Picture winner from 1982, Gandhi, places above Ordinary People solely because it has more reviews counted, making it a wider positive consensus – that same logic has been applied to the next two films on the list as well. Gandhi earns its score with 111 reviews. The film, directed by Richard Attenborough, stars Ben Kingsley and tells the story of the famous Indian activist, with the events of the film spanning most of his life.
The film was another powerhouse in a packed year at the Oscars. It won eight of the 11 awards for which it was nominated – including Best Director, Actor (Kingsley) and Screenplay. Other notable films that were nominated that year include Blade Runner, Sophie’s Choice, E.T., The Verdict, Tootsie, Das Boot, Poltergeist and Tron.
2 Platoon (1986) – 89%
Platoon
- Release Date
- December 19, 1986
- Director
- Oliver Stone
- Cast
- Keith David, Forest Whitaker, Francesco Quinn, Kevin Dillon, John C. McGinley, Reggie Johnson
- Rating
- R
- Runtime
- 120
- Main Genre
- Action
Next on the list is arguably the defining film of Oliver Stone’s career, 1986’s Platoon. The film lands above Ordinary People and Gandhi, as it holds its 89% approval based on 123 reviews. The plot of the film is based directly on Stone’s personal experiences in the Vietnam War, and it stars a variety of recognizable names such as Tom Berenger, Willem Dafoe, Charlie Sheen, Keith David, Forest Whitaker, and Johnny Depp.
The film won a total of four Oscars – with the other three being for Director, Film Editing and Sound. Dafoe and Berenger were both nominated for Supporting Actor as well. With other films such as Blue Velvet, The Color of Money, The Fly, Hoosiers, Top Gun, and Aliens nominated that year, Platoon was able to come out on top amid some stiff competition.
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1 Amadeus (1984) – 89%
Amadeus
- Release Date
- September 19, 1984
- Director
- Milos Forman
- Cast
- F. Murray Abraham, Tom Hulce, Elizabeth Berridge, Simon Callow, Roy Dotrice, Christine Ebersole
- Rating
- R
- Runtime
- 160
- Main Genre
- Biography
Finally, the highest-rated Best Picture winner of the ‘80s on Rotten Tomatoes is 1984’s Amadeus. Also with an 89% approval, the film lands atop this list with a total of 154 gathered reviews. Impressively, it also holds a 95% audience score, the highest of any film on this list. It was nominated for a total of 11 Oscars, and it ultimately ended up winning eight of them.
Other films represented at the Academy Awards that year included Places in the Heart, The Killing Fields, The Karate Kid, Beverly Hills Cop, Splash, Footloose, Purple Rain and 2010. Of all the Best Picture winners from the ‘80s, Amadeus is the one that has upheld its reputation the most thoroughly. It is still widely considered to be one of the best films ever produced, and it’s no surprise to see it in the top spot here.
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