I need an 80s movie (and a 90s one, etc.)

"Guess Who's Coming for Dinner" is a good one for the 60s.

 

The Big Chill is perfect for the 1980s.

So much of the 80s was about Baby Boomers getting older.

 

How about the original "Red Dawn"?

Anti-Russia propaganda/paranoia, guns, pickup trucks, mullet haircuts ...

It's got mid-1980s America down cold.

 

Fully agree on that. "Field of Dreams" is really timeless, although IMO it feels more like a late Seventies movie.

"Apollo 13" is no good for a Nineties movie; it's set entirely in 1970.

"The Paper," another Ron Howard movie, is a quintessential mid-Nineties movie, along with mid-Nineties tech (pagers, chunky cell phones, fax machines, Mac Classics) but has way too many F-bombs to pass your litmus test.

"Ferris Bueller" is good for an 80s film for the same reason: Ferris is a computer geek, but on an old-style machine.

 

For the 1990s, I will throw out American Beauty as best representation of the decade...however since it may be too strong, give them "toy story."

 

Gotta go with Wall Street over Breakfast Club for the 80s For the 80s, would Do The Right Thing fit the bill?
90s - Surprised nobody mentioned The Truman Show yet.

 

"You've Got Mail" caught the mid-90s moment when email was the next big thing. And has aged awfully as a result; I don't think I've seen it anywhere, on any cable channel or anything, since about 2005.

 

Roger and Me for the 80s.

A cleaned up version of Office Space for the 90s.

 

Um yeah, If you could get a cleaned up version of Office Space, that would be great.

 

70s: All The President's Men

 

Did anyone mention Wargames for the 1980s? Cold War fear.

 

Real Genius would be another good 80s movie.