The 1980s (pronounced "nineteen-eighties", shortened to "the '80s" or "the Eighties") was a decade that began January 1, 1980, and ended December 31, 1989.
The decade saw a dominance of conservatism and free market economics, and a socioeconomic change due to advances in technology and a worldwide move away from planned economies and towards laissez-faire capitalism compared to the 1970s. As economic deconstruction increased in the developed world, multiple multinational corporations associated with the manufacturing industry relocated into Thailand, Mexico, South Korea, Taiwan, and China. Japan and West Germany saw large economic growth during this decade. The AIDS epidemic became recognized in the 1980s and has since killed an estimated 40.4 million people (). Global warming theory began to spread within the scientific and political community in the 1980s.
The final decade of the Cold War opened with the US-Soviet confrontation continuing largely without any interruption. Superpower tensions escalated rapidly as President Reagan scrapped the policy of détente and adopted a new, much more aggressive stance on the Soviet Union. The world came perilously close to nuclear war for the first time since the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, but the second half of the decade saw a dramatic easing of superpower tensions and ultimately the total collapse of Soviet communism.
Developing countries across the world faced economic and social difficulties as they suffered from multiple debt crises in the 1980s, requiring many of these countries to apply for financial assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. Ethiopia witnessed widespread famine in the mid-1980s during the corrupt rule of Mengistu Haile Mariam, resulting in the country having to depend on foreign aid to provide food to its population and worldwide efforts to address and raise money to help Ethiopians, such as the Live Aid concert in 1985.
By 1986, nationalism was making a comeback in the Eastern Bloc, and the desire for democracy in socialist states, combined with economic recession, resulted in Mikhail Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika, which reduced Communist Party power, legalized dissent and sanctioned limited forms of capitalism such as joint ventures with companies from capitalist countries. After tension for most of the decade, by 1988 relations between the communist and capitalist blocs had improved significantly and the Soviet Union was increasingly unwilling to defend its governments in satellite states.
The 1980s was an era of tremendous population growth around the world, surpassing the 1970s and 1990s, and arguably being the largest in human history. During the 1980s, the world population grew from 4.4 to 5.3 billion people. There were approximately 1.33 billion births and 480 million deaths. Population growth was particularly rapid in a number of African, Middle Eastern, and South Asian countries during this decade, with rates of natural increase close to or exceeding 4% annually. The 1980s saw the advent of the ongoing practice of sex-selective abortion in China and India as ultrasound technology permitted parents to selectively abort baby girls.
The 1980s saw great advances in genetic and digital technology. After years of animal experimentation since 1985, the first genetic modification of 10 adult human beings took place in May 1989, a gene tagging experiment which led to the first true gene therapy implementation in September 1990. The first "designer babies", a pair of female twins, were created in a laboratory in late 1989 and born in July 1990 after being sex-selected via the controversial assisted reproductive technology procedure preimplantation genetic diagnosis. Gestational surrogacy was first performed in 1985 with the first birth in 1986, making it possible for a woman to become a biological mother without experiencing pregnancy for the first time in history.
The global internet took shape in academia by the second half of the 1980s, as well as many other computer networks of both academic and commercial use such as USENET, Fidonet, and the Bulletin Board System. By 1989, the Internet and the networks linked to it were a global system with extensive transoceanic satellite links and nodes in most developed countries. Based on earlier work, from 1980 onwards Tim Berners Lee formalized the concept of the World Wide Web by 1989. Television viewing became commonplace in the Third World, with the number of TV sets in China and India increasing by 15 and 10 times respectively.
Halley's Comet, Comet Halley, or sometimes simply Halley, officially designated 1P/Halley, is the only known short-periodcomet that is consistently visible to the naked eye from Earth, appearing every 75–79 years. It last appeared in the inner parts of the Solar System in 1986 and will next appear in mid-2061.
Halley's periodic returns to the inner Solar System have been observed and recorded by astronomers around the world since at least 240 BC, but it was not until 1705 that the English astronomer Edmond Halley understood that these appearances were re-appearances of the same comet. As a result of this discovery, the comet is named after Halley. (Full article...)
Boris Franz Becker (German pronunciation:[ˈboːʁɪsˈbɛkɐ]ⓘ; born 22 November 1967) is a German former world No. 1tennis player. Becker is the youngest-ever winner of the gentlemen's singles Wimbledon Championships title, a feat he accomplished aged 17 in 1985. Becker was featured in the list of Tennis magazine's 40 greatest players on its 40th anniversary in 2006. He won 64 titles overall, including an Olympic gold medal in doubles in 1992. Becker won 49 singles and 15 doubles titles including six Grand Slam singles titles: three Wimbledon Championships, two Australian Opens and one US Open, 13 Masters titles, three year-end championships and leading Germany to back-to-back championship wins in Davis Cup 1988 and 1989.
Becker is often credited as a pioneer of power tennis with his fast serve and all-court game. He is also among the top ten players with the best win percentages in the history of the ATP Tour. In 1989, he was voted the Player of the Year by both the ATP and the ITF. Becker is arguably the greatest Davis Cup singles player with a win percentage of 92.70%, a win loss record of 38–3 and two championship wins for Germany. In his autobiography, Andre Agassi described Becker as the world's most popular tennis star in the late 1980s. (Full article...)
Image 2The world map of military alliances in 1980: NATO & Western allies, Warsaw Pact & other Soviet allies, Non-aligned countries, China and Albania (communist countries, but not aligned with USSR), ××× Armed resistance (from Portal:1980s/General images)
Image 9The Grateful Dead in 1980. Left to right: Jerry Garcia, Bill Kreutzmann, Bob Weir, Mickey Hart, Phil Lesh. Not pictured: Brent Mydland. (from Portal:1980s/General images)
Image 21Stage view of the Live Aid concert at Philadelphia's JFK Stadium in the United States in 1985. The concert was a major global international effort by musicians and activists to sponsor action to send aid to the people of Ethiopia who were suffering from a major famine. (from Portal:1980s/General images)
The film's title is taken from a short story in Ian Fleming's 1966 short story collection Octopussy and The Living Daylights, although the film's plot is mostly original. It does, however, contain a scene adapted from the Fleming short story "The Property of a Lady" (included in 1967 and later editions of Octopussy and The Living Daylights). The events of the short story "Octopussy" form part of the title character's background and are recounted by her in the film. (Full article...)
The screenplay of Blue Velvet had been passed around multiple times in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with several major studios declining it due to its strong sexual and violent content. After the failure of his 1984 film Dune, Lynch made attempts at developing a more "personal story", somewhat characteristic of the surrealist style displayed in his first film Eraserhead (1977). The independent studio De Laurentiis Entertainment Group, owned at the time by Italian film producer Dino De Laurentiis, agreed to finance and produce the film. (Full article...)
The film started as a collaboration between Henson and Froud following their previous collaboration The Dark Crystal (1982). Terry Jones of Monty Python wrote the first draft of the film's script early in 1984, drawing on Froud's sketches for inspiration. Various other scriptwriters rewrote it and added to it, including Laura Phillips, Lucas, Dennis Lee, and Elaine May—although Jones received the film's sole screenwriting credit. It was shot from April to September 1985 on location in Upper Nyack, Piermont, and Haverstraw, New York, and at Elstree Studios and West Wycombe Park in the United Kingdom. (Full article...)
The Evil Dead is a 1981 American independentsupernatural horror film written and directed by Sam Raimi (in his feature directorial debut). The film stars Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, Richard DeManincor, Betsy Baker, and Theresa Tilly as five college students vacationing in an isolated cabin in the woods, where they find an audio tape that, when played, releases a legion of demons and spirits. Four members of the group suffer from demonic possession, forcing the fifth member, Ash Williams (Campbell), to survive an onslaught of increasingly gory mayhem.
Raimi, Campbell, producer Robert G. Tapert, and their friends produced the 1978 short filmWithin the Woods as a proof of concept to build the interest of potential investors, which secured US$90,000 to begin work on The Evil Dead. Principal photography took place on location in a remote cabin in Morristown, Tennessee, in a filming process that proved extremely uncomfortable for the cast and crew. The film's extensive prosthetic makeup and stop-motion effects were created by artist Tom Sullivan. The completed film had its world premiere at the Redford Theatre in Detroit on October 15, 1981, and attracted the interest of producer Irvin Shapiro, who helped screen the film at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival. Horror author Stephen King gave a rave review of the film, which resulted in New Line Cinema acquiring its distribution rights and giving it a wide theatrical release on April 15, 1983. (Full article...)
The plot follows the title character, Strawberry Shortcake, who lives in a fictional place called Strawberryland. In the special, narrated by Mr. Sun, she and her friends celebrate her sixth birthday, and with preparations for her party underway, a villain called the Peculiar Purple Pieman plots to steal the berries from Strawberry's home for making the "pies" that Strawberry baked. (Full article...)
Inchon's plot includes both military action and human drama. Characters face danger and are involved in various personal and dramatic situations. The film concludes with the American victory over North Korean forces in the Battle of Inchon, which is considered to have saved South Korea. Produced on $46 million with filming taking place in South Korea, California, Italy, Ireland and Japan, it encountered many problems during production, including a typhoon and the death of a cast member. Both the Unification movement and the United States military provided personnel as extras during the filming. (Full article...)
Parker initially turned down an opportunity to direct, believing that the complex book could not be successfully adapted for a feature film. The project resurfaced in 1982 when A&M Films, a subsidiary of A&M Records, acquired the film rights and commissioned Sandy Kroopf and Jack Behr to write the screenplay. Upon reading the script, Parker returned as director, and the film continued development at Tri-Star Pictures. Principal photography began in May 1984 and concluded in August of that year. Filming took place on locations in Philadelphia and Santa Clara, California. The film is notable for being the first to be partially shot with the Skycam, a computer-controlled camera system created by Steadicam inventor Garrett Brown. The score was composed by Peter Gabriel. (Full article...)
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Begotten is a 1989 American experimentalsilenthorror film written, directed, and produced by E. Elias Merhige. It stars Brian Salsberg, Donna Dempsy, Stephen Charles Barry, and members of Merhige's theatre company, Theatreofmaterial. Its unconventional narrative depicts the suicide of a godlike figure and the resulting births of Mother Earth and the Son of Earth, who set out on a journey across a barren landscape. The film does not contain dialogue, with its visual style evoking early silent films.
Mr. India is a 1987 Indian Hindi-language superhero film directed by Shekhar Kapur and produced jointly by Boney Kapoor and Surinder Kapoor under the Narsimha Enterprises banner. The story and screenplay was written by the duo Salim–Javed in what was their last collaboration before their split. Starring Anil Kapoor, Sridevi, and Amrish Puri, the film tells the story of Arun Verma (Kapoor), a humble violinist and philanthropist who receives a cloaking device that grants him invisibility. While renting out his house to pay his debts, he meets the journalist Seema Sahni (Sridevi) and falls in love with her. Meanwhile, the criminal Mogambo (Puri) has plans to conquer India.
After watching his previous directorial venture Masoom, a 1983 family drama about children, Boney Kapoor approached Kapur to make another film with similar themes. Principal photography, handled by Baba Azmi, took place in Srinagar, Mumbai, and other locations in India, starting in July 1985, and finished after 350 days. Laxmikant–Pyarelal composed the soundtrack, while Akhtar wrote the lyrics. After filming ended, Waman Bhonsle and Gurudutt Shirali jointly edited it; Peter Pereira completed the special effects. (Full article...)
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Kids Can Say No!, stylized as Kids Can Say No, is a 1985 Britishshorteducational film produced and directed by Jessica Skippon and written by Anita Bennett. It is intended to teach children between ages five and eight how to avoid situations where they might be sexually abused, how to escape such situations, and how to get help if they are abused. In the film, Australian celebrity Rolf Harris is in a park with a group of four children and tells them about proper and improper physical intimacy, which he calls "yes" and "no" feelings. The film has four role-playing scenes in which children encounter paedophiles, with Harris and the children discussing each scene.
Harris said that he came up with the idea for the film on a 1982 Canadian tour when he saw Vancouver's Green Thumb Theatre production of Feeling Yes, Feeling No, a play about child sexual abuse. Kids Can Say No!, released in October 1985 on VHS in the United Kingdom, was the first British children's film about sexual abuse and was purchased by police forces, educational institutions, and libraries across Europe. Upon the film's release, The Times obtained opinions from four sexual-abuse experts, who unanimously opposed using Kids Can Say No! or any other film to teach children about the subject. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation received a positive response to its 1988 broadcast of Kids Can Say No! and therefore broadcast it a second time that year. Harris and Skippon collaborated on the 1986 sequel Beyond the Scare, which advises teachers about what to do if a child discloses abuse. Showings of Kids Can Say No! eventually decreased as VHS became less popular in favour of DVD-Video in the late 1990s and early to mid-2000s. (Full article...)
After criticism that Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) received, Spielberg chose to make a more lighthearted film for the next installment, as well as bringing back several elements from Raiders of the Lost Ark. During the five years between The Temple of Doom and The Last Crusade, he and executive producer Lucas reviewed several scripts before accepting Jeffrey Boam's. Filming locations included Spain, Italy, West Germany, Jordan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. (Full article...)
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The Care Bears Movie is a 1985 animatedmusicalfantasy film directed by Arna Selznick from a screenplay by Peter Sauder. It was the second feature film from the Canadian animation studio Nelvana after the 1983 film Rock & Rule, in addition to being one of the first films based directly on a toy line and the first based on Care Bears. It introduced the Care Bears characters and their companions, the Care Bear Cousins. The voice cast includes Mickey Rooney, Georgia Engel, Jackie Burroughs and Cree Summer. In the film, an orphanage owner (Mickey Rooney) tells a story about the Care Bears, who live in a cloud-filled land called Care-a-Lot. While traveling across Earth, the Bears help two lonely children named Kim and Jason, who lost their parents in a car accident, and also save Nicholas, a young magician's apprentice, from an evil spirit's influence. Deep within a place called the Forest of Feelings, Kim, Jason and their friends soon meet another group of creatures known as the Care Bear Cousins.
American Greetings, the owners of the Care Bears characters, began development of a feature film adaptation in 1981. Later on, the card company chose Nelvana to produce it and granted them rights to the characters, in addition to financing the film along with cereal manufacturer General Mills and television syndicator LBS Communications. Nelvana's founders were producers, with fellow employee Arna Selznick directing the film. Production lasted eight months, with a production budget of at least $2 million, and took place in Canada, Taiwan, and South Korea. Carole King and John Sebastian contributed several songs for the film. Though major American film studios passed on the project, newly established independent distributor The Samuel Goldwyn Company acquired the distribution rights to the film and soon spent a record $24 million promoting it. (Full article...)
After the financial backing from Tsui Hark became problematic following the release of A Better Tomorrow 2, Woo had to find backing through Chow Yun-fat's and Danny Lee's financing companies. Woo went into filming The Killer with a rough draft whose plot was influenced by the films Le Samouraï, Mean Streets and Narazumono. Woo wanted to make a film about honour, friendship and the relationship of two seemingly opposite people. After finishing filming, Woo referred to The Killer as a tribute to directors Jean-Pierre Melville and Martin Scorsese. (Full article...)
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The Daicon III and IV Opening Animations are two 8 mm film anime short films that were produced for the 1981 Daicon III and 1983 Daicon IV Nihon SF Taikai conventions. They were produced by a group of amateur animators known as Daicon Film, who would later go on to form the animation studio Gainax. The films are known for their unusually high production values for amateur works and for including numerous references to otaku culture, as well as its unauthorized appropriations of the Playboy Bunny costume. Usage of the songs "Runaway" by Bill Conti (from the soundtrack to the 1981 James Bond film For Your Eyes Only) as well as "Twilight" and "Hold On Tight" by English rock band Electric Light Orchestra were also unauthorized.
Daicon III was made by Hideaki Anno, Hiroyuki Yamaga and Takami Akai and Daicon IV credits twelve people, including Yamaga as the director and Anno and Akai as animation supervisors. Despite the questionable legal status of the works, the production of Daicon III resulted in debts that were repaid by selling video tapes and 8 mm reels of the production, the profits of which went to the production of Daicon IV. In 2001, the anime magazine Animage ranked the Daicon animations as the 35th of the "Top 100" anime of all time. (Full article...)
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