Given the usage of brand to demonstrate social status, films of the Eighties regularly used costume and wardrobe to delineate class and aspiration. Eddie Murphy was well known to wear a yellow gold Rolex Day Date President in his private time, a superb choice whatever the decade, but in Beverley Hills Cop he wore a digital Casio. We don’t sell these but we do like them rather a lot, in all iterations. In Beverley Hills Cop II a Patek Philippe Gondola is featured prominently, yet again highlighting brand and wealth as worn by the bad guy Maxwell Dent.

Watches In Films

Two of Tom Cruise’s greatest hits of the Eighties were Cocktail and Top Gun. Risky Business was also amazing, but the star was that awesome Porsche 928. In Cocktail, when Tom Cruise’s Flanagan starts to earn well in Jamaica, he wears a steel Rolex Air King, one of our favourite watches of all time. Understated and reliable, any steel Rolex wears well, especially getting air time on a mixologists wrist. When Coughlin marries into wealth, his choice, unsurprisingly, is a gold Cartier, which today has a retro class as opposed to the brashness of Coughlin and his “law”.

In Top Gun, theres a lot of online debate about editing issues, and it does appear that Top Gun pilots can change their watch before taking off. The film’s stand out watch is a Porsche Design Military Chronograph, by Orfina. An utter design classic which dates from the ‘70s, Porsche Design chronographs also feature prominently in The Professionals, as well as on Lewis Collins’ wrist in Who Dares Wins. We have similar for sale, albeit in titanium rather than PVD.

Weekend at Bernies is the daft comedy that has a Marmite following. We like Marmite. Bernie, the crooked insurance fraudster wears his Rolex Day Date throughout the film, until is is “inherited” by Andrew McCarthy’s Larry Wilson and is indeed considered waterproof. If you don’t get the reference, watch the film again.

Back to the Future gets a mention because it is utterly awesome, we all love a Delorean, and the Casio Calculator, no matter how cheesy, is one of the horological icons of the 1980s. Andrew at Vintage & Prestige loves his, and allegedly still has the receipt from 1985. In this case, the box and papers may make a difference, but its irrelevant, apparently its not for sale, although its rarely, if ever, seen on his wrist.