A pedantic notion of decades, and other virtual movie fun

We had our first "virtual drinks" on Sunday afternoon with a couple friends. The husband of the other couple decided to use the Zoom meeting technology to prepare a little movie quiz for us. I didn't think it was necessary, but it ended up being fun. And besides, just because we could talk about coronavirus for 80 minutes, that doesn't mean it's what we should do -- what was any good for our mental health.

The premise of the game was that I was going to send him my favorite movie from each of the years featured in a movie book he had called Movies of the 80s, which you see to your right. He was going to record my answers and then his own answers, and then our wives were going to try to guess what the other husband had chosen -- not their own husband, but the other husband. That seemed counterintuitive to me, but then again, probably better to make a game of who knows the other husband better than who knows their own husband better. The latter is fraught with peril, especially at a time when we are probably already getting on each others' nerves anyway.

So he sent me the book's table of contents, as you will see in the pictures below, which included each movie year and then a list of movies that they had selected to discuss from that year -- or in some cases, not from that year, but again, more on that in a moment.

I'll include below what my options were and what I chose; I don't remember in every case what his choices were, but that's okay, because you don't know him anyway.

But I wanted to start by poking holes in this book's definition of what a decade is.

When I got the photo of the first page from him, the first movie year they discussed was 1981. I thought that it was weird that they had excluded 1980, but kind of brushed it off until I saw the last year they discussed: 1990.

I was honestly flummoxed how they could make such an egregious error -- though as you will see, it was not the only one. Then I realized what they were doing, which was defining the decade extremely pedantically.

As you may remember when the calendar rolled over to 2000, everyone had a handful of obnoxious people in their lives who insisted on telling them that it was not really the start of the 21st century. No, because there was never a year 0, that meant that the 21st century did not actually start until the year 2001.

However true that may have been, I found it annoying. In this case it behoved us to develop a more practical definition of a century, or a millennium, one which recognized the utility of putting like with like. If it had a 2 at the start of the year, it belonged with the third millennium, and if it had zeroes as the second and third digits, it belonged with the first decade and century of that millennium, not the last of the previous.

This book, apparently, is one of those obnoxious/annoying people.

Whether the 1980s really began in 1981 or not, that's not how we do things. Best of the decade lists comes out in years ending in 0, as we all know from the year we are currently in. Everyone whose anyone considers 2010 as part of the teens, not the aughts, though it might have interested me to have the academic debate with myself whether Tangled, a 2010 release, would have also been my favorite movie of last decade.

I think it should have struck someone who was related to this book as weird that a book about the movies of the 1980s contained the year 1990 in it. Sometimes you need to rely on the sniff test, and this should not have passed it.

Anyway. Let's move on.

Below I'll include the photos of each two-page spread (as proof, I guess) and my choice among the available movies. And just a comment on those movies. I'm not sure what kind of book this is supposed to be, but it contains some totally obvious choices (as you would expect) and some I've never heard of. The latter can be a perfectly fine way of doing things, but it just begs the question why they didn't include some of the choices you'd think would be slam dunks. (No Raiders of the Lost Ark in 1981?) My choice will be in bold, movies I haven't seen will be in italics.

1981

Escape from New York
Lola
Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid
Conan the Barbarian
Fitzcarraldo
Body Heat
Clean Slate
Das Boot
Blow Out
Time Bandits
Prince of the City

Time Bandits is #32 for me on Flickchart so this was a pretty easy choice, though Das Boot would give it a run for its money. The other guy chose Body Heat, which I thought was a funny choice, particularly for him. I know, I haven't seen Conan.

1982

Flashdance
Fanny and Alexander
E.T.
Tootsie
Scarface
Querelle
The King of Comedy
Blade Runner
Gandhi
The Draughtman's Contract
Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

What the hell is Querelle? This book has got a stiffy for Rainer Werner Fassbinder as Lola in 1981 was also directed by him. (And I actually could not find enough of his stuff easily accessible to even include him in Audient Auteurs a few years ago, as I'd wanted to.) No real competition for Blade Runner as E.T. has dropped in my estimation in recent years. I think he chose The King of Comedy.

1983

Rumble Fish
Once Upon a Time in America
Nostalghia
The Right Stuff

What, was 1983 a particularly shit year? Funny that they could not find a similar number of titles to discuss as other years, all of which have more than ten. At least of the two I've seen, there was an obvious favorite in Once Upon a Time in America. Though I do like Rumble Fish too.

1984

Desperately Seeking Susan
Paris, Texas
The Terminator
Ghostbusters
Blood Simple
Brazil
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Amadeus
Body Double
Beverly Hills Cop
A Passage to India

I was only a Passage to India away from seeing all of these, though I only just saw Paris, Texas last year. I believe we both chose Ghosbusters on this one, one of only two times we both selected the same movie.

1985

Back to the Future
To Live and Die in L.A.
The Fly
Blue Velvet
Prizzi's Honor
Hannah and Her Sisters
Out of Africa
Ran
Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome
Tea in the Harem
My Beautiful Laundrette

Back to the Future is my #2 movie of all time. 'Nuff said. He picked The Fly. Also a good choice. Never even heard of Tea in the Harem.

1986

A Room with a View
The Untouchables
Highlander
Tampopo
Platoon
The Green Ray
Aliens
Down by Law
She's Gotta Have It
Stand by Me

There was a little uncertainty here -- I chose Stand by Me because I know it's #74 on my Flickchart (I mean, I knew it was in the top 100, I looked it up just now to find out the exact number). But I have to figure that if I saw it again now it probably would drop out of the top 100. However, I still probably rank it ahead of Aliens and The Untouchables. He picked Platoon, which I only saw recently and found disappointing.

1987

Full Metal Jacket
A Fish Called Wanda
Fatal Attraction
Au Revoir Les Enfants
The Last Emperor
Frantic
A Chinese Ghost Story
Near Dark
RoboCop
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Lethal Weapon
House of Games
Wall Street

Now this is where things get screwy. My choice, A Fish Called Wanda, did not come out in 1987. Not in any country did it come out in 1987. Its world premiere was in New York in July of 1988. I think it's funny that the world premiere was not in England, but there you have it. Though, just as a reminder that people can be fallible, I always think of it as a 1989 movie, though obviously I'm wrong. I think he selected Lethal Weapon, though it might have been Full Metal Jacket. If I were forced to select a movie that actually came out in 1987, from these choices, I guess it would be Full Metal Jacket, though I only really love the first half.

1988

Die Hard
Rain Man
Dead Ringers
Working Girl
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
The Naked Gun
Mississippi Burning
Dead Poets Society
Batman
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Dangerous Liaisons

*Game show buzzer* Uh uh. At least three more incorrect release years. What crack was the editor of this book smoking? The Last Crusade, Dead Poets Society and Batman all came out in 1989, and those were just the ones I checked to make sure I wasn't going crazy. Sloppy. Side note: First year where I had seen all the movies.

1989

sex, lies and videotape
Miller's Crossing
Pretty Woman
Time of the Gypsies
Crimes and Misdemeanors
When Harry Met Sally ...
My Left Foot
Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!
Born on the Fourth of July
Sweetie

The problem is becoming more profound the later we get in the decade. Miller's Crossing and Pretty Women came out in 1990, and therefore, should not even appear in this book (by my definition). I really wanted to go with Miller's Crossing (despite the incorrect year) but I just had to admit to myself that my favorite romantic comedy of all time had to be recognized. In its correct year at that.

1990*

*invalid year

Home Alone
Dances With Wolves
I Hired a Contract Killer
Total Recall
Wild at Heart
Edward Scissorhands
Misery
Bullet in the Head
Goodfellas

Really good year. Was tempted by Total Recall, Dances With Wolves, Edward Scissorhands and Misery (his selection), but how can you go against Goodfellas? You can't. The book seems to have gotten itself back on track as these all appear to be in the correct release year.

The other wife ended up beating my wife in the competition. But I guess his wife has known me longer than she's known his husband. Anyway.

Okay, not sure if the effort to put this together was borne out in the amount of pleasure you derived from reading it, if you did read the whole thing. But, I also don't think there's any better description of everything we do during Life Under Quarantine.