Sweet Dreams (Are Made of 80's Nostalgia)

The 1980’s - decade of big hair, bright colors, and movies that stand the test of time. The 80’s gave us hit songs like “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper and “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” by Wham!, films like The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and of course, Michael Jackson’s moonwalk. 

As a society, we seem to be captivated by the 1980’s. Current pop culture reflects this phenomenon; the remake of the 1984 film Ghostbusters, or the Netflix series Stranger Things that is the epitome of 80’s nostalgia. And the 80’s lust goes far beyond the film industry. More and more, 80’s fashion and beauty trends are seeping into today’s magazines and the pages of Instagram influencers. Bright and colorful eyeshadow looks, natural brows, and bold blushes are in - just as they were 30 years ago. People are even getting perms again. 30 years after the end of the decade, people still yearn for the 80’s. 

30 years - this number is not accidental. A pop culture phenomenon called the nostalgia pendulum is one of the reasons why the 1980’s reign supreme even in the 2010’s and 2020’s. Identified by Patrick Metzger, the nostalgia pendulum is a theory that pop culture lives on a 30 year cycle. After analyzing films and their modern remakes, he realized that the average time it took for a hit film to be remade was around 23 years, and he came to the conclusion that around the 30 year mark is when past pop culture tends to swing back around. Even in the 80’s, people were romanticizing about a “better” time - the 1950’s and 1960’s. This is why some of our favorite 80’s movies aren’t even set in the time period, but a few decades before. Back to the Future and Dirty Dancing, two 80’s classics, are prime examples of this. 

“Pop culture is forever obsessed with a nostalgia pendulum that regularly resurfaces things from 30 years ago” - Patrick Metzger

The most likely reason for the 30 year gap is this: it's about the time that it takes for a generation to grow up and enter the working world. This means that the majority of the workforce in 2020 is people who grew up in the 1980’s, who have fond memories and a bit of nostalgia for that time period. These are the people producing films, promoting trends, and dominating the media. They are the creators of our culture, and why wouldn’t they want to create remakes of their favorite childhood movies, revive the styles they once admired? This generation is now the producers making films as well as the consumers with disposable income, eager to shell out the money to relive their childhood. 

For those born long after the 80’s ended, maybe the longing for a different time means something else entirely. Older adults are nostalgic for a time they wish they could return to, but teens and younger adults are wistful for something they’ve never had; a time without ever present technology. The 1980’s were the last decade before the explosion of technology and social media. One might say that the 1990’s ushered in a new era entirely. The way we live our lives was irrevocably changed. It’s charming in a way, to see Ferris Bueller free to run all over Chicago without his parents checking his Find My Friends location, to watch Jake call Sam’s phone in Sixteen Candles and get her grandparents on the line instead of her because she doesn’t have an iPhone. These are simple things that would never happen in our own lives. Maybe technology does make our lives more convenient, but it also takes away some of the risk, some of the adventure. Maybe that’s why we find 80’s movies so appealing. While technology seeks to make our lives easier, in many ways it burdens us even more so. The 1980’s provide a glimpse into life free of social media and the modern problems that come along with it. 

However, perhaps this is just human nature. Idealizing the past isn’t new, and the 1980’s certainly aren’t the first decade to be romanticized. People are always looking backwards with rose colored glasses, remembering things to be sweeter than they were. There’s nothing wrong with reliving the great pop culture and trends of the past, but eventually we must move forward. And I for one, am excited for the years to come and what is ahead - 1990’s and 2000’s nostalgia!