Greatest & Most Meaningful Movies of Our Era

Posted by empathicBeauty29-11@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 67 comments

What movies touched you growing up? That have always stuck with you, that you watch over and over? A couple for me, The Breakfast Club, The Back to the Future Series, original Star Wars, Indiana Jones Series. Seeing these in the movie theater was so exciting back in the day, not like now. So many good ones....how do you choose??

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mammothhockey@reddit

River's Edge.

Great fucking movie.

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beebs44@reddit

Grunge before grunge

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Key-Cattle-2866@reddit

Star Wars

Blade Runner

Heathers

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cowmix@reddit

Heathers felt like the first GenX movie (beyond the John Hughes stuff).

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freerangeXkid@reddit

And shortly after Heathers Christian Slater was in Pump Up The Volume. The soundtrack for that movie is permanently stuck in the CD player of my truck because you can't stream a number of the amazing songs on it

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Cysteine_Chapel64@reddit

Which ones are your favorites? My standouts are the slower version of Wave of Mutilation by The Pixies and the Peter Murphy song.

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freerangeXkid@reddit

The Cowboy Junkies' version of Robert Johnson's "Me And The Devil Blues" is one of the most haunting and beautiful songs I've heard. Rollins and Bad Brains covering MC5 is epic. And Above The Law's Freedom Of Speech is an incredible hip-hop hit with the perfect bass to test your speakers.

That slow Pixies song is the proper version for sure, and Peter Murphy's cheeky pop song was a cook departure from his "Deep" album.

These 5 are my fav for sure. But the whole soundtrack is great

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Save-theZombies@reddit

Hello Dad I'm in Jail! Was my favorite but that whole soundtrack rocked.

Pump Up The Volume is still my favorite teen movie.

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Cysteine_Chapel64@reddit

I definitely person playlisted that.

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cowmix@reddit

Pulp Fiction was the first critical / big film made by and for GenX.

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Sumeriandawn@reddit

Made by GenX? Tarantino, Rhames, Jackson , Willis and Travolta are all Boomers

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cowmix@reddit

Tarantino is right on the cusp of being GenX from a strict definition side. Pretty much everything about him like how he grew up etc he definitely is Gen x.

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lovebeinganasshole@reddit

His movies always have one scene I cannot watch.

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Lashon_Von_Ricks@reddit

Yes and it’s actually a great movie, unlike many that will be named in the comments.

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Itchy-Grapefruit2756@reddit

Red dawn

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Soulshiner402@reddit

Porkys

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Ms_Anne-Thrope@reddit

Jaws

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JJQuantum@reddit

The Raiders of the Lost Ark. Indiana Jones is a hero. I still believe in heroes.

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ReverieJack@reddit

Desperately Seeking Susan

Making Mr. Right

Something Wild

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xenya@reddit

Labyrinth, Say Anything, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Pulp Fiction, Heathers, True Romance, Natural Born Killers, The Crow

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ServoWHU42@reddit

Before Sunrise

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Old_Association6332@reddit

Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Coming to America, Trading Places, Ghostbusters, Ghost

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rbrumble@reddit

Dead Poet's Society

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furniguru@reddit

Stand By Me

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b_o_m@reddit

Almost all my favorite movies are from that era, but the most impactful for me (for completely different reasons) were Breaking Away and This is Spinal Tap.

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Bokononfoma@reddit

Breaking Away for sure.

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RealtorRVACity@reddit

Fried Green Tomatoes and The Color Purple

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IranticBehaviour@reddit

Breakfast Club is a bit of a personal touchstone. There were so many great movies through the 70s to the 90s, though. As far as a lasting impact on my family goes, Willow, Labyrinth and Princess Bride, plus basically all Monty Python movies. And the whole extended family loves the Star Wars and Star Trek universes.

My favourite less-known flick is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead from 1990. I think Tom Stoppard wrote it, it's sorta Hamlet told from the perspective of those two minor characters. A couple of pretty amazing performances of the titular pair by Gary Oldman and Tim Roth (both very young looking, watching it today, lol). An equally young Iain Glen of Game of Thrones fame is Hamlet, while Richard Dreyfuss is the Player. Def worth a watch, imo. I don't think any of the big streamers have it for free, pretty sure Apple and Prime rent/sell it, but it occasionally pops up on Tubi and Plex and some of the other free streaming platforms.

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Optimal-Ad-7074@reddit

yes!!! this one is incredible.

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ActuaryFew6884@reddit

I still remember seeing "Flight of the Navigator" in the theater and it stuck with me. Plus, Paul Reubens does the voice

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lovebeinganasshole@reddit

Die Hard (spawned a ridiculous amount of witty action movies), Heat (which I see movies and tv shows replicate the st shoot out to this day), Fatal Attraction (be wary of that one night stand.)

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ranchoparksteve@reddit

I haven’t seen Strange Brew yet.

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bluudclut@reddit

I was 10 years old when Star Wars came out. I was too young to go on my own. So my Mum pulled me out of school to go to 'the dentist' the showing was half empty. Brilliant.

We came out and walked past the ridiculous long line by now. It blew my mind. It was a true cultural moment. I can sit here all these years later and remember everything about it 😁

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Cysteine_Chapel64@reddit

Star Wars was my first memory of seeing any movies at all. It was at a literal drive in.

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everything_is_holy@reddit

I was also 10. We saw it at a drive-in. Magical.

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JonathanTrager@reddit

Star Wars no contest. It was so much of my childhood. I was 8 in 1977 when it came out. 50 years later it’s still a huge part of my life.

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BatGlittering7781@reddit

I was 5 when I first saw Star Wars in the theater. 49 years later I am watching Maul with my kids.

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kevbayer@reddit

The Star Wars saga, Big Trouble in Little China, The Muppet Movie, Star Trek 2, Labyrinth, Dark Crystal.

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RealityDependency@reddit

Without question

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whatsamattafuhyou@reddit

Dances with Wolves

Dead Poets Society

Ghostbusters

Caddyshack

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LaLunacy@reddit

Rocky Horror. Mostly because of the other audience members.

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JenLiv36@reddit

I went every Saturday I could from ages 15-17 from midnight to 2am at Clinton Street Theater in Portland Oregon. It was so much a part of my teen years.

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elphring@reddit

Greatest and most meaningful to me?

Stop Making Sense (1984)

I turned 16 right before it was released, and was in possession of a new and first driver’s license. I drove a bunch of friends (legally) to a matinee showing in Oakland at the Paramount theater. We were the only ones there. We asked the projectionist if he could turn the volume way up. He did. We danced around the theater as it played.

Our 16 year old minds were blown by the end.

I hope I never forget that day.

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Key-Cattle-2866@reddit

One of the greatest concert films ever made.

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deadbeef4@reddit

I’ve got a tape I’d like to play you…

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elphring@reddit

A perfect beginning to a masterpiece of cinema and performance.

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Prime88@reddit

Die Hard and Aliens

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thegreatgatsB70@reddit

The Natural, The Color of Money, The Bad News Bears, Friday. I play billiards, and I played baseball, and well Friday....

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StandingDave@reddit

They couldn't make that version of Bad News Bears today

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thegreatgatsB70@reddit

Nope, it was perfect for the time, and the reboot was crap. Too many people are in their feelings and would cry because of fun they were having. The pussyfication of our time is almost complete.

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notguiltybrewing@reddit

Ones that meant the most to me were the John Hughes movies. Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, etc. I grew up in that area (on the poor side of the tracks).

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Cute-Calligrapher-50@reddit

The coming of age movies you see while you're young, like Good Will Hunting, Dead Poets Society, Scent of a Woman, they'll always stick with me even if, looking back at 50, theyre a little sappy.

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