The Best 1980s Biopic
Which of these 35 top rated biopics of the 1980s is your favorite?
After voting, you may discuss the poll here.
Note: Titles with at least 5,000 votes are included.
After voting, you may discuss the poll here.
Note: Titles with at least 5,000 votes are included.
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35 titles
- DirectorMilos FormanStarsF. Murray AbrahamTom HulceElizabeth BerridgeThe life, success and troubles of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, as told by Antonio Salieri, the contemporaneous composer who was deeply jealous of Mozart's talent and claimed to have murdered him.
- DirectorDavid LynchStarsAnthony HopkinsJohn HurtAnne BancroftA Victorian surgeon rescues a heavily disfigured man who is mistreated while scraping a living as a side-show freak. Behind his monstrous façade, there is revealed a person of kindness, intelligence and sophistication.
- DirectorMoustapha AkkadStarsAnthony QuinnOliver ReedRod SteigerIn 1929, Italian Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini appoints General Rodolfo Graziani as colonial governor to Italian Libya with orders to stamp-out all resistance from Libyan nationalists led by rebel guerrilla leader Omar Mukhtar.
- DirectorMartin ScorseseStarsRobert De NiroCathy MoriartyJoe PesciThe life of boxer Jake LaMotta, whose violence and temper that led him to the top in the ring destroyed his life outside of it.
- DirectorRichard AttenboroughStarsBen KingsleyJohn GielgudRohini HattangadiThe life of the lawyer who became the famed leader of the Indian revolts against the British rule through his philosophy of nonviolent protest.
- DirectorMori MasakiStarsIssei MiyazakiCatherine BattistoneYoshie ShimamuraA powerful statement against war, Barefoot Gen is a disturbing story about the effect of the atomic bomb on a boy's life and the lives of the Japanese people.
- DirectorSeijirô KôyamaStarsTatsuya NakadaiKaoru YachigusaToshinori OmiThe true story about a dog's loyalty to its master, even after his death.
- DirectorPaul SchraderStarsKen OgataMasayuki ShionoyaHiroshi MikamiA fictionalized account in four chapters of the life of celebrated Japanese writer Yukio Mishima.
- DirectorEdward ZwickStarsMatthew BroderickDenzel WashingtonCary ElwesRobert Gould Shaw leads the U.S. Civil War's first all-black volunteer company, fighting prejudices from both his own Union Army, and the Confederates.
- DirectorPhilip KaufmanStarsSam ShepardScott GlennEd HarrisThe U.S. space program's development from the breaking of the sound barrier to selection of the Mercury 7 astronauts, from a group of test pilots with a more seat-of-the-pants approach than the program's more cautious engineers preferred.
- DirectorRoland JofféStarsSam WaterstonHaing S. NgorJohn MalkovichA journalist is trapped in Cambodia during tyrant Pol Pot's bloody 'Year Zero' cleansing campaign, which claimed the lives of two million 'undesirable' civilians.
- DirectorJim SheridanStarsDaniel Day-LewisBrenda FrickerAlison WhelanChristy Brown, born with cerebral palsy, learns to paint and write with his only controllable limb - his left foot.
- DirectorBernardo BertolucciStarsJohn LoneJoan ChenPeter O'TooleBernardo Bertolucci's Oscar-winning dramatisation of the life story of China's last emperor, Pu Yi.
- DirectorCosta-GavrasStarsJack LemmonSissy SpacekMelanie MayronWhen an idealistic American writer disappears during the Chilean coup d'état in September 1973, his wife and father try to find him.
- DirectorUli EdelStarsNatja BrunckhorstEberhard AurigaPeggy BussieckA teen girl in 1970s Berlin becomes addicted to heroin. Everything in her life slowly begins to distort and disappear as she befriends a small crew of junkies and falls in love with a drug-abusing male prostitute.
- DirectorKenneth BranaghStarsKenneth BranaghDerek JacobiSimon ShepherdIn the midst of the Hundred Years War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.
- DirectorMichael AptedStarsSissy SpacekTommy Lee JonesLevon HelmThe fictionalized life of singer Loretta Lynn, a girl who rose from humble beginnings to become a country music star in the 1960s/70s.
- DirectorRichard AttenboroughStarsDenzel WashingtonKevin KlineJosette SimonSouth African journalist Donald Woods is forced to flee the country after attempting to investigate the death in custody of his friend, the Black anti-Apartheid activist Steve Biko.
- DirectorDavid Hugh JonesStarsAnne BancroftAnthony HopkinsJudi DenchTrue story of a transatlantic business correspondence about used books that developed into a close friendship.
- DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsGérard DepardieuWojciech PszoniakAnne AlvaroIn 1793, as the Terror begins in France, Georges Danton, a champion-of-the-people, returns to clash against Maximilien Robespierre and his extremist party.
- DirectorBarry LevinsonStarsRobin WilliamsForest WhitakerTom T. TranIn 1965, an unorthodox and irreverent DJ named Adrian Cronauer begins to shake up things when he is assigned to the U.S. Armed Services radio station in Vietnam.
- DirectorRamón MenéndezStarsEdward James OlmosEstelle HarrisMark PhelanThe story of Jaime Escalante, a high school teacher who successfully inspired his dropout-prone students to learn calculus.
- DirectorWarren BeattyStarsWarren BeattyDiane KeatonEdward HerrmannA radical American journalist becomes involved with the Communist revolution in Russia, and hopes to bring its spirit and idealism to the United States.
- DirectorPeter BogdanovichStarsCherEric StoltzSam ElliottA teenager with a massive facial skull deformity and biker gang mother attempt to live as normal a life as possible under the circumstances.
- DirectorOliver StoneStarsTom CruiseBryan LarkinRaymond J. BarryThe biography of Ron Kovic. Paralyzed in the Vietnam war, he becomes an anti-war and pro-human rights political activist after feeling betrayed by the country for which he fought.