August 29, 2013 50 Funniest Movies
Flavorwire has a list up of what they consider the 50 Funniest Movies Ever Made. It seems my lot in life to respond to these sorts of things (as opposed to coming up with them on my own), and so I shall. Honestly, I don’t even know how a person can put together a list like this. I haven’t even seen many of these, for one. And ranking “funniest”? Whew. Tough task. I mean, I liked Waiting for Guffman more than Office Space, but is it funnier? Tough call.
So below I’ve supplied their list. I’ve bolded the ones I’ve seen, and afterwards I’ll make a (much shorter) list of my own. It ain’t Tuesday, I know, but the allure of lists is too strong.
50. Wet Hot American Summer
49. Borat
48. I’m Gonna Git You Sucka
47. Bridesmaids
46. There’s Something About Mary
45. Clueless
44. When Harry Met Sally
43. Office Space
42. Stripes
41. Waiting for Guffman
40. Some Like It Hot
39. Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein
38. Road to Morocco
37. Wayne’s World
36. Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
35. Bringing Up Baby
34. To Be or Not to Be
33. Arthur
32. The Birdcage
31. The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
30. Bananas
29. A Fish Called Wanda
28. Bill Cosby: Himself
27. Lost in America
26. Safety Last!
25. The Gold Rush
24. The Producers
23. Love and Death
22. Trading Places
21. Sherlock, Jr.
20. The Jerk
19. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
18. M*A*S*H
17. The Big Lebowski
16. Tootsie
15. Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
14. Coming to America
13. Young Frankenstein
12. Caddyshack
11. National Lampoon’s Animal House
10. The Bank Dick
9. Richard Pryor: Live in Concert
8. Raising Arizona
7. Ghostbusters
6. A Shot in the Dark
5. Blazing Saddles
4. Duck Soup
3. This is Spinal Tap
2. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
1. Airplane!
There are 20 of those 50 I haven’t even seen, and I’ll tell you right now that any “funniest” list that doesn’t have Ghostbusters higher than #3 is suspect in my eyes already.
In the interests of not confusing the issue, I’ll compare apples to apples and only use the movies they’ve listed here for my following list. Again, though “funniest” will play a part, I’m going to call this a “Favorite funny movies as a subset of the given list” list. It isn’t catchy, but it’s very descriptive.
10. Office Space
9. Raising Arizona
8. Waiting for Guffman
7. Young Frankenstein
6. This is Spinal Tap
5.Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
4. The Jerk
3. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
2. Airplane!
1. Ghostbusters
So, some prompts for the comments section:
- What are your favorites from their given list?
- What movies should have been on their list? (Other than Pulp Fiction – that movie is hilarious, yo).
- General outrage at my choices, which is always welcome.
- The original movie title was “Ghost Busters.” Why have we combined the words? I mean, it’s better combined, but I don’t know how that happened.
Tags: lists
Written by: Mark
- 13 comments
- Posted under Movies
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bd
said
You should see Some Like It Hot and Bringing Up Baby. They’re great. And it shocks me you haven’t seen Himself
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Mark
said
I’ve heard the album, but didn’t feel I could count that.
I’m pretty sure I’ve seen bits of Bringing Up Baby, but not enough to remember it. I do like Cary Grant, certainly. And I don’t believe I’ve seen ANY Marilyn Monroe movie at all, if you can believe that.
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d4v34x
said
Listen to bd, and now also to me. Watch them.
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Derek
said
I generally agree with your list but given the inclusion of Spinal Tap I believe you had an imperative to make the list 11 items long.
Ghostbusters is my favorite movie so it belongs on the top of all lists. I also love dark comedies so my list (which would go to 11) would have The Cable Guy in 10th or 11th. But then room really needs to be made for Wayne’s World so TGG might get bumped out of contention. Lists are hard.
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Mark
said
re: 11 entries – Argh! Missed opportunity!
I need to rewatch Cable Guy, as it’s been a loooooooooong time.
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Derek
said
You have to have a certain sensibility to love it like I do. I also really like Death To Smoochy for the same dark comedy type reasons.
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Mark
said
I can enjoy a good dark comedy.
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Mandy
said
You must watch the Birdcage. Nathan Lane is excellent.
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Mark
said
My Nathan Lane tolerance levels have lowered over the years…
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Mandy
said
I also love him in the 2010 version of The Producers. Haven’t seen the original yet.
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d4v34x
said
Also, I didn’t think Tootsie was so much funny as . . . cute. But you should watch it.
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Joe
said
I agree here. It was a good enough movie, and I’m glad I watched it. I’m not sure I would’ve ranked it that high on that particular list.
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Joe
said
I don’t know if I need to apologize for this, but #1 on my list would be “Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie” and #2 would “Dumb and Dumber”.
I haven’t seen Ghost Busters since I was a kid so would have to go back and re-watch it to move it higher up on my list. The original list had pretty good ones at #1 and #2 in my opinion.