Four LionsĬhris Morris co-wrote and directed an incredibly clever 2010 dramedy that introduced the world to future Oscar nominee Riz Ahmed. The Coens won Best Original Screenplay and Frances McDormand took her first Oscar home for playing the unforgettable Marge Gunderson, a Minnesotan cop who gets entangled in a car salesman’s deeply inept foray into the criminal world. Joel and Ethan Coen’s 1996 masterpiece is only one of the best films ever made, a story of violence and redemption in the great American North. It’s a great example of a talented comedy ensemble elevating a mediocre script. It’s a funny flick, the story of an underdog team of dodgeball players that includes great supporting turns from Rip Torn, Justin Long, Stephen Root, and Alan Tudyk too. Vince Vaughn and Ben Stiller starred in a fan favorite from 2004 that turned everyone’s favorite middle school sport into a physical comedy. Films at the convenience and video stores at which Smith worked in real life with his buddies, no one could have expected that Clerks would still be influencing writers a quarter-century later. Kevin Smith rocked the indie filmmaking world with a comedy that was shot for almost nothing and became a worldwide hit. Co-starring Judi Dench, Alfred Molina, Lena Olin, and Johnny Depp, it was so successful that it was nominated for Best Picture. Lasse Hallstrom directs the story of Vianne Rocher (Juliette Binoche), who opens a chocolaterie in a small village in France. One of the most successful was the 2000 dramedy Chocolat, based on the 1999 novel of the same name by Joanne Harris. There was a time when whimsical European rom-coms were all the rage. Beatty’s Oscar-nominated script is razor sharp and hysterical. The legendary actor plays a California Senator on a re-election campaign who basically goes off the traditional rails, expressing himself in ways that politicians aren’t usually prone to do. Warren Beatty wrote, directed, and starred in this amazing black comedy from 1998 that feels almost timelier today than when it was released. Cohen brilliantly plays with how much harder it was to make a Borat film now than everyone recognizes the character, while also digging deep into the issues of 2020 like response to the pandemic, the increasingly vocal racism of the country, and the grossness of Rudy Giuliani. Sacha Baron Cohen returned to his most iconic character in 2020 with this sequel to his smash hit Borat, and it instantly became one of the most talked-about films of the year. You kind of have to be an asshole not to like it. It’s really as crowd-pleasing as comedies get.
Gordon loosely adapt their own story, with Nanjiani starring alongside Zoe Kazan. It’s not common for a breakthrough comedy to be so acclaimed and popular that it actually becomes an Oscar nominee for Best Screenplay, but The Big Sick is not a typical comedy (and Holly Hunter was robbed of a nomination too, by the way). In fact, Big Daddy - the story of a slacker who ends up having to take care of an actual child - is Sandler’s biggest non-animated hit at the box office, a reminder when his comedies landed in theaters instead of just on Netflix (and when they were much, much funnier too). The 1999 Adam Sandler comedy came in the wake of The Wedding Singer and The Waterboy and really helped solidify the Sandman as one of the biggest stars in the world.
The template for so many movies to come, The Apartment is a daring dissection of toxicity in the story of an insurance clerk (Jack Lemmon) who lets his coworkers use his apartment to support their infidelity. It’s hard to believe that Billy Wilder’s masterpiece is over six decades old given that it’s a film that feels as timeless as ever.
BEST GAY MOVIES ON PRIME 2021 MOVIE
It’s a template movie for hundreds of relationship comedies to come. You know how the Academy ignores comedy when they hand out Oscars? Not this time: Annie Hall won awards for Best Screenplay, Best Director, Best Actress, and even Best Picture. Coogan plays Tony Wilson, the head of Factory Records, and the dramedy charts the emergence of groups like Joy Division, New Order, and Happy Mondays. Michael Winterbottom directs his muse Steve Coogan (the two also worked together on The Trip movies, Tristram Shandy, and others) in this biopic of the vibrant Manchester music scene in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s.