After my 70s movie didn’t give me anything I wanted to write about (Mean Streets), I got to an 80s movie. I find it much easier to talk about the 60s and 70s, for one thing because they seem more special to me, but also because I find it harder to grasp the 80s, to get a feel for them. Maybe also because I was born in 1980 and it’s harder to view a decade if you’ve actually been there. Distance certainly helps. Anyway, the 80s to me are somewhat the antithesis of the 60s and 70s, which were a time where real change was possible, while the 80s felt like taking two steps back. But instead of the conservatism of the 50s, the 80s were governed by extreme capitalism and a superficiality that is often mocked but still true. Even if it’s an overgeneralization (as it must be if you try to summarize 10 years in history in a few keywords), there’s a reason why MTV, hairstyles and silly pop music are representative for this era.