For my 2000s and 1990s lists, I picked 10 films released each year in the decade. In doing the same for earlier decades, I encountered a new problem... rather than the problem of narrowing favourites down to 10, I was now stuck with having seen less films per year, and not all the films I've seen are worthy of sneaking into a top 10 list that way. So for the 80s, here are 8 films per year released between 1980 and 1989 that I have enjoyed.
The list is arranged in an order using an average of IMDb, Metacritic, and Rotten Tomatoes ratings (with #8, #16, etc, being the top-rated film by this method). My personal #1 of each year doesn't always end up in top spot using this method, but I will make a separate list of my #1s.