100 Funniest Movies (Part 6 ~ # 75-71)

Pee Wee's Big Adventure - 1985

Pee Wee Herman: A child trapped in a man's body who lives out his fantasies in claymation or live action. Someone has stolen Pee Wee's beloved red bicycle, and he isn't taking it lying down. He survives one debacle after another with pure ingenuity, his dance to "Tequila" by The Champs being the most obvious example. Do you realize how rare it is that a film acheives critical success, financial success and then somehow despite all these accolades still qualifies as a cult film. This is the debut feature film by the mad genius Tim Burton too.

Long before Jack Klugman & Tony Randall made it a great TV series, there was the original 'Odd Couple', Matthau & Lemmon. What we find are two very different actors with different strengths comedically who play off each other with ease. Lemmon is purely physical comedy with a gift for voices, whereas Matthau is the straight-ahead-sarcasm machine! They are linked forever through that silly Grumpy Old Men series too.

The Odd Couple - 1968

Neil Simon's classic play is turned into a movie about two divorced men, Felix Ungar and Oscar Madison who try living together for awhile. When Felix is so depressed that he is thinking of suicide he is taken in by his best friend out of pure pity. The pity however wears thin after Felix, a prissy neat-freak starts to ruffle feathers with the gleefully messy Oscar. Great supporting cast as well.

Through the late 1990s, Parker Posey starred in a large number of independent films and was named Queen of the Indies by Time Magazine, which cited 32 independent films to her credit including, Dazed and Confused ~1993, Kicking and Screaming ~ 1996, The House of Yes ~ 1997, The Daytrippers ~ 1997, Clockwatchers ~ 1997, Henry Fool ~ 1998, and more recently The OH in Ohio ~ 2006 about a woman who has never had an orgasm. None of these films made the list, but don't worry, we'll be seeing her again. She is also a major player in Christopher Guest's Mockumentary Troupe.

Party Girl - 1995

Join me for the misadventures of Mary, the free-spirited, drug inducing "Party Girl" who crashes into reality while busted for charging admission to a rave she is hosting. Her best friends Leo (The Club DJ) and Derrick (The Queen) are of little to no help until, she is bailed out by her Godmother Judy. In order to pay Judy back, she takes a job as a librarian. That's where the fun begins....Check Out The Clip!

This is for all the actors, theaters goers, and just plain lovers of Rowan Atkinson. This is also for lovers of Musicals, the movie Waiting for Guffman and the ska music of Madness. For people who like Twisted Romantic Comedies a/k/a British Comedies mixed with an absurdist wit. This is the first feature by writer Richard Curtis who gave us Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill & Love, Actually, the last two I have not yet seen.

The Tall Guy - 1989

Meet Dexter King (Jeff Goldblum). He is an American actor living in London who has a small part in a very successful comedy revue. He is..."The Tall Guy" playing secong fiddle to the evil and domineering star Ron Anderson (Rowan Atkinson). Dexter shares a flat with his platonic-but-nymphomaniac roommate named Carmen and is dating a lovely nurse with a penchant for orange clothes named Kate (Emma Thompson). The love scene between them is a hilarious, apartment destroying romp featuring Ms. Thing's nipples too. Yes, everything is finally turning around for Dexter until he promptly calls out his jerk boss and quits the show! He is mired in depression trying to find another show and eventually gets hired as the lead in a musical based on The Elephant Man! If you ever wanted to take Andrew Lloyd Webber down a notch, don't miss it.

John Cusack, wow. There's a lot of comedy there. The ones I really really like but just couldn't fit in our countdown are..

1. One Crazy Summer ~ 1986 with Demi Moore
2. Hot Pursuit ~ 1987
3. Tapeheads ~ 1988
4. Money for Nothing ~ 1993
5. Grosse Pointe Blank ~ 1997
6. High Fidelity ~ 2000

Say Anything... - 1989

Lloyd Dobler is the Generation X anti-hero that we all know and love. He's an average guy, likes kick-boxing, and soul classics and is generally happy just being himself. Then he falls in love with the Valedictorian of his graduating class, Diane Court. His friend Corey (Lili Taylor) writes songs about Joe, some guy who ditched her. Real-lfe sister Joan Cusack takes an uncredited role for support along with this emsemble cast...Ione Skye, John Mahoney, Jeremy Piven, Eric Stoltz and even Philip Baker Hall shows up as an IRS agent!

The List So Far...

100) Being John Malkovich

99) Weird Science

98) Private Benjamin

97) American Beauty

96) Brewster's Millions

95) A League of Their Own

94) Defending Your Life

93) Swimming With Sharks

92) Harold and Maude

91) The Bad News Bears

90) Shaun of the Dead

89) Ciao Professore!

88) About A Boy

87) Nobody's Fool

86) Ghostbusters

85) The 40-Year-Old Virgin

84) Moonstruck

83) The Snapper

82) Stripes

81) We're No Angels

80) Heathers

79) Much Ado About Nothing

78) Bottle Rocket

77) The Out-of-Towners

76) Finding Nemo

75) Pee Wee's Big Adventure

74) The Odd Couple

73) Party Girl

72) The Tall Guy

71) Say Anything...