The 10 biggest box office hits of the 1980s

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The 1980s was the heyday of fantasy, comedy, and teen romance. It gave us heroes like Indiana Jones and the Ghostbusters, and a little alien named E.T.

Long before streaming or internet videos, moviegoing was an experience, one fans would pay top dollar for, filling cinemas and grossing hundreds of millions of dollars for filmmakers.

There are a few ways to count success, but going by Box Office Mojo and ScreenRant, here are the top 10 (domestic) box office hits of the 1980s, ranked.

10 Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom – $179 million

The best Indiana Jones film (don’t @ us), comes at the bottom of the top 10 heap, which still isn’t bad considering the film made nearly $180 million in the U.S. and the franchise dominated the entire decade.

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9 Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade – $197 million

As we said: Indy dominated the box office in the ‘80s. The prequel/threequel of the series, The Last Crusade, brought in nearly $200 million. That’s what you get when you combine the star powers of Harrison Ford and Sean Connery.

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8 The Empire Strikes Back – $209 million

Again the best in the series is shunted toward the bottom of the top 10, but the second Star Wars film, aka Episode V, won big in 1980.

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7 Back To The Future – $210 million

The film may largely take place in 1955, but Back to the Future scored big with audiences in 1985 when it was released. Still a fashion icon, Michael J. Fox’s Marty McFly (his name literally has “fly” in it) tears up his 1950s town and sets the franchise up well for years to come.

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6 Raiders Of The Lost Ark – $212 million

Hey again, Indiana. The original Indiana Jones film blasted past the competition in 1981, winning nine Academy Awards and forever defining the action-adventure-comedy genre.

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5 Ghostbusters – $229 million

Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis, and Ernie Hudson teamed up to protect humanity from ghouls and kill it at the box office. Ghostbusters was built on a lot of comedy talent and a lot of New York City pride, ultimately placing in the middle of the decade-long pack.

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4 Beverly Hills Cop – $234 million

It turns out you don’t need an intergalactic war or jokey ghost hunters or time travel to win over audiences. All you need is Eddie Murphy. This cop adventure flick was really just a vehicle for Murphy’s comedic talent and dry one-liners, as he skewered Los Angeles culture in 1984.

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3 Batman – $251 million

Batman may be the dark knight, but he shined like a diamond in Tim Burton’s whacky spin on the comic book hero in 1989. Michael Keaton faced off against Jack Nicholson as the Joker and Billy Dee Williams as Two-Face, ultimately clinching the bronze for domestic gross.

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2 Return of the Jedi – $252 million

The final installment of the original Star Wars trilogy, Return of the Jedi netted a quarter of a billion dollars when it was released in 1983, outpacing the previous installment by $50 million. It rounded out the story nicely, while leaving room for later generations to pick up the narrative (and create some of the top-grossing Disney movies of all time).

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1 E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial – $359 million

The magic of E.T. was recognized right when it came out in 1982. Nominated for a host of Oscars, including Best Picture, Director, and Screenplay, it ultimately won for Original Score, Visual Effects (duh), Sound Mixing, and Sound Editing. But it’s real coup was at the theaters, where it brought in a whopping $350 million in the U.S. (and $663 million worldwide).

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