History of Science Fiction Films - 1980s

1980s

Following the huge success of Star Wars, science fiction became bankable and each major studio rushed into production their available projects. As a direct result, Star Trek was reborn as a film franchise that continued through the 1980s and 1990s. Ridley Scott's Alien was significant in establishing a visual styling of the future that became dominant in science fiction films including "The Black Hole", "Saturn 3", "Outland", "2010", "Enemy Mine", and "Aliens (film)" through its sequels and Scott's Blade Runner; far from presenting a sleek, ordered universe, these films presented the future as dark, dirty and chaotic.

Thanks to the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises, escapism became the dominant form of science fiction film through the 1980s. The big budget adaptations of Frank Herbert's Dune and Arthur C. Clarke's sequel to 2001, 2010, were box office duds that dissuaded producers from investing in science fiction literary properties. The strongest contributors to the genre during the second half of the decade were James Cameron and Paul Verhoeven with The Terminator and RoboCop entries.

Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial became one of the most successful films of the 1980s. An influential film release was Scanners (1981), a film that would be imitated several times over the next two decades.

From 1980, the distinction between science fiction, fantasy, and superhero films blurred, thanks in large part to the influence of Star Wars. From 1980 on, every year saw at least one major science fiction or fantasy film, which critics disparaged and were ignored on Oscar night, except in the technical categories. Disney's 1982 film Tron had a unique visual style, being one of the first major studio films to use extensive computer graphics.

The 1980s and later saw the growth of animation as a medium for science fiction films. This was particularly successful in Japan where the anime industry produced Akira (1988) and Ghost in the Shell (1995). Serious animation has not yet proven commercially successful in the United States and Western-made animated science fiction films such as Light Years (1988), The Iron Giant (1999) and Titan A.E. (2000) did not draw a significant viewing audience. However, anime has gradually gained a cult following and from mid-1990s its popularity has been steadily expanding worldwide.