21st Century Film Comedies: No Laughing Matter?

21st Century Film Comedies:
No Laughing Matter?
by Steve Finkelstein

As I look at my list of the twelve movies I've seen this year (yes, I do keep a log of all the movies I've seen; OCD can be a terrible cross to bear), I notice only one good comedy film on that list: Shrek 2, and that's an animated film, fer Crissakes! In fact, when I think of the decent film comedies the new millennium has produced, fully one third of them have been animated: Chicken Run, The Emperor's New Groove, Shrek and Monsters, Inc.

It seems that all the sharp, hip writing has drifted over to the animated field for some unfathomable reason. However, there were some good live action comedies in the new century: Wonder Boys, High Fidelity, Best in Show, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Bridget Jones's Diary, About a Boy, Punch Drunk Love, A Mighty Wind, School of Rock and Bad Santa. A good, if largely uninspiring group of comedies. Why uninspiring? Because, with the exceptions of O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Wonder Boys and Punch Drunk Love, none of them were excellent. The other films seemed more intent on producing smiles and the occasional snicker than a series of sustained belly laughs.

Let's take the examples of Best in Show and A Mighty Wind. Many of my contemporaries professed great admiration for these films, and not without good reason. They are good, witty and smart comedies, which in today's banal film climate is no mean feat. However, they tend to be a little dry for my taste. I found myself smiling in admiration of their intelligent satire, but rarely did I bust a gut from laughing. (I will say, however, that I found a few sequences in A Mighty Wind to be very funny. Those were the scenes that included the OCD concert promoter, played by Bob Balaban. Quite a coincidence, I know.)

While the category of comedy films may not be in quite as miserable shape as horror presently is, it does seem to be somewhat rudderless. It desperately needs some brilliant writer-directors to bring some life back to the genre. For awhile, it seemed that the Coen Brothers (O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Fargo) were going to fit that bill; however, the boys have fallen on hard times since then. Intolerable Cruelty was precisely that (at least for the viewers), and The Ladykillers was another failed attempt at screwball comedy. Hopefully, this stretch of films is nothing more than a slump.

The movie comedies of this decade can't compare to those of the 70's. At that time, you had comic geniuses such as Woody Allen and Mel Brooks producing their best work: Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Silent Movie, Annie Hall, Manhattan and Play It Again, Sam. Talk about consistently brilliant comedy material!

But maybe my standards are just too damn high. After all, I'm a film buff, a student and lover of great comedies, going all the way back to the Silent Era. I've seen many wonderful films. Here are the 12 that I consider to be the Greatest Comedy Films of All-Time, listed in chronological order:

The General (1927)
Duck Soup (1933 )
Sons of the Desert (1933 )
It Happened One Night (1934)
Modern Times (1936)
The Bank Dick (1940)
Sullivan’s Travels (1941)
Some Like It Hot (1959)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
M*A*S*H (1970)
Annie Hall (1977)
The Big Lebowski (1998)

Hopefully, many of you are familiar with at least a few of these titles. For those that are a bit unfamiliar, take a few minutes and look them up at www.imdb.com. There you'll get not only cast listings and plot synopses, but reviews as well. Better yet, take a chance and pick one up the next time you're renting movies. I assure you, you won't be disappointed. Whether you end up with the acting of Laurel and Hardy or W.C. Fields, the direction of Billy Wilder, or the writing of Preston Sturges, you will end up experiencing some of the original luminaries of the genre.

See ya soon.

Steve can be reached at steve@babblog.com.