1983 Was A Crappy Year For Movies

If you are at all familiar with my movies lists then you know that I am working on creating 2 lists for each year that movies have been made, a Ratings list, in which I list all of the films and my ratings for a given year, and a Top 15 list in which I list what I consider to be the best 15 films of the year. Here's my Ratings list and Top 15 list for 2001.

Starting with the most recent years I've slowly but surely been working my way back through previous years, through the 90s and into the 80s, until this evening when I finally stumbled upon what I think is the nadir of Hollywood film making, 1983.

1983 was such a bad year for movies that of the 1983 films I have seen only 5 of them get a good rating. My Top 15 was so skimpy that I ran out of films and had to include two 5-star movies in the 14th and 15th place. 1983 was so bad that Mr. Mom made $65 million dollars at the box office in 1983 dollars. That's probably $100 million in today's dollars.

When I look through the films of 1983 and see what was available to the movie going public I get very, very tired because of the boringness of these offerings. Yes, Return of the Jedi was out in theaters but so was Stroker Ace (1983) and Lone Wolf McQuade (1983). Superman III was out, Jaws 3-D (1983) was out, Smokey and the Bandit III (1983) and Amityville 3-D (1983) was out. Gene Hackman was doing voice over work in Two of a Kind (1983) for Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta. And then there's Doctor Detroit. Probably one of the worst films I've ever had the displeasure of seeing theatrically. Thank god my taste in films matured.

The Academy Award pickings were so slim that Lalo Schifrin's music got nominated for for The Sting II! At least Yentl wasn't nominated for Best Picture. That probably would have finished me off. Here's hoping 1982 is halfway decent. :-)