All right, fellow *old people* that were around to truly experience it: what films, made either in the 1980s or more recently, capture what it was really like to be a young person during that decade? Do not suggest any titles by John Hughes. Or St. Elmos Fire, because I attended the college portrayed in that ridiculous movie. It seems kind of amazing to me that if I asked a bunch of 60-70 year olds the same question about the 60s, theyd have no trouble listing a bunch of films, and yet I can only think of a few that get the 80s. Strangely enough, what first comes to my mind is a British film (and maybe even more so the TV mini-series that followed it), This Is England. Its not the skinhead or mod cultures I empathize with as much as it is the way it captured the undercurrents of desperation and frustration that so many young people felt when faced with the society being created for them by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. The knowledge that we would be the first generation to be worse off than our parents (yeah, Gen X, not Gen Y). The Cold War, high unemployment, inflation, AIDS, terrorism, wars in the Middle East and Latin America, the culture wars against the NEA, the crack epidemic and the insane levels of violence that came with it... just a few of the things that were happening when I was in my teens and early 20s... At the same time really amazing music was being made in the city where I lived--Washington, DC--and in Athens, GA and Leeds, England and Los Angeles and Providence, RI and and and and and Im sure my brain is just stuck and there were filmmakers out there capturing it all, or would-be filmmakers out there soaking it all in, and I want to know or recall who they are and what they made. https://youtube/watch?v=H0jkv2bRFgQ
Posted on: Sat, 12 Jul 2014 18:52:49 +0000