Welcome to an exciting year-long project here at The Nerdy. 1986 was an exciting year for films giving us a lot of films that would go on to be beloved favorites and cult classics. It was also the start to a major shift in cultural and societal norms, and some of those still reverberate to this day.
We’re going to pick and choose which movies we hit, but right now the list stands at nearly four dozen.
Yes, we’re insane, but 1986 was that great of a year for film.
The articles will come out – in most cases – on the same day the films hit theaters in 1986 so that it is their true 40th anniversary. All films are also watched again for the purposes of these reviews and are not being done from memory. In some cases, it truly will be the first time we’ve seen them.
This time around, it’s August 8, 1986, and we’re off to see A Fine Mess, One Crazy Summer, She’s Gotta Have It, and Transformers: The Movie.
A Fine Mess
This film feels like such a throwback; I wondered if it belonged in this decade project.
Spencer (Ted Danson) overhears two gangsters drugging a race horse to win a race. Armed with the information, he ropes in his friend Dennis (Howie Mandel) to place a bet while trying to allude the gangsters. After one bad decision after another, the two friends end up on the run from the mafia and involved with the Don’s wife.
All of the performances are fine, but the script was just so low brow that I couldn’t get behind it. Nothing really made me laugh, or even crack a smile. I was just present while it was on the TV.
Where to watch: Available to stream.
One Crazy Summer
What if you tried to do Better Off Dead again, but worse?
Hoops McCann (John Cusack) has just graduated high school and it trying to get into the Rhode Island School of Design. His entrance exam requires him to make an animation based on romance, but he’s never been in love. He heads off to Nantucket with his friend George (Joel Murray) and along the way meets Cassandra (Demi Moore), an aspiring musician headed the same way. You’re may be shocked to learn romance happens.
It’s clear that writer & director Savage Steve Holland was settling into a formula. The problem is the second time he attempted it felt like we were dealing with the leftovers that weren’t good enough for the first one.
Cusack plays nearly the same character. We have another friend who hangs around and thinks they’re cool in their own way. We even have another case of a younger sibling who may be the smartest person in the film.
I love Better Off Dead, but this truly feels like the leftovers that had neared their expiration date.
Where to watch: Available to stream.
She’s Gotta Have It
This film was so wildly ahead of its time you have to wonder how in the world it happened.
Nola Darling (Tracy Camilla Johns) is a woman trying to live her life as a free woman. This means that she can have as many sexual partners as she wants and be tied down to no man. The men, however, have different opinions on how she should live. And even once she gets a “happy ending,” it’s still not enough for Nola.
How this film existed in 1986 is beyond me. This is so wildly different than anything else that was coming out at the time, and it’s clear the immeasurable influence it had on early 90s cinema with the likes of Slacker and Clerks, and I don’t just mean the black & white aethestic.
The fact this was Spike Lee’s first film is jaw dropping. He showed a maturity that many far more experienced directors could only dream of. Perhaps there is something to be said for the theory of sometimes we succeed at something because we simply don’t know that we can’t.
If you’ve never seen this, run, don’t walk, to add it to your 80s education.
Where to watch: Available to stream.
Transformers: The Movie
If you’ve ever wondered why Gen X is the way it is, you’ve just found the source of our generational trauma.
Optimus Prime and the Autobots continue their war, not realizing a far greater enemy is approaching in the form of Unicron. Optimus and Megatron engage in combat with the Autobot leader succumbing to his wounds, and Megatron being fundamentally changed by Unicron into Galvatron. The biggest question is who is now worthy to lead the Autobots and take on the Matrix of Leadership.
Hasbro knew it had a popular property on its hands and needed to change out the characters. What better way to do it than release a movie that just wholesale slaughters the current toys?
For an animated movie, the level of violence shown to the original toys/characters borders on horrifying. Prowl gets shot and you see smoke come out of his mouth and glow go out of his eyes. Random characters are dropped in an acid pit and you watch their tortured faces as they die.
And the Optimus death scene is just… yeah.
This movie is so much more hardcore than it needed to be. In some ways you have to respect it. In other ways you need to see a therapist after watching it.
Where to watch: Available to stream.
1986 Movie Reviews will continue on Aug. 15, 2026, with Armed and Dangerous, The Boy Who Could Fly, The Fly, and Manhunter.
