“Good” cinema is, most of the time, thought off as something serious and dramatic. A movie with intense acting and complicated characters, sometimes with boring and long scenes. Seldom do we recognize the astronomical talent that it takes to make a different kind of film. A film that encompasses all the latter virtues, yet does it in an even harder way, by entertaining the audience constantly, and killing them with laughter. These people are known as comics.
Comedies are enjoyed by absolutely everyone. The genre has been alive since the early beginnings of cinema, and has, over the last few decades, really established itself as a complex art. There are many people who indulge in comedies. Kids movies, which mostly rely on “slapstick” comedy, such as Despicable Me, or Space Jam, mostly rely on physical comedy to make an impact, such as dancing or falling. However, comedy goes past that. Teenangers comedies tend to rely on raunchy sex jokes, while adult comedy can range from dark jokes, to political humour, to really anything in between. Overall, comedy is one of those genres that caters to absolutely everybody. There is not one type of funny thing, just because somebody doesn't like one movie, it does not mean they won’t like the next.
Around every 10 to 15 years, a new movie will be released that will relate to most teenangers of the time. From Grease, to Fast Times at Ridgemont High, to Superbad, these comedies relate to the particular experience of the teenangers of the time, and most of the time, happen to be comedies. Take for example, Superbad, by Judd Apatow. This movie came out during a time where the popular teen flicks relied heavily on vulgar comedy, nudity, and unrealistic situations. Movies like American Pie, depicted teenangers in a disgusting and stereotypical manner, as though every teenage boy was a rapist waiting to attack any woman who would look their way. These movies, although entertaining, did not actually relate to any teenangers. That’s why when Superbad, a quirky movie about three dorks who are just very awkward with girls, and end up, going home when they see their crush is too drunk to consent, and some of the absolutely funniest comedy, comedy that does not rely on curse words or disgusting things, teenangers adopted that movie as their new mantra. Now decades after the movie came out, this is still one of the most iconic comedies of our time. No matter what halloween party you go to, whether it’s college or middle school, there will always be one or maybe more boys wearing their McLovin vests.
Comedy has been popular since the early beginning of cinema. “Slapstick” comedy was dominated by the legend Charlie Chaplin, who, with no words, managed to make an audience cackle out loud, using his, and other actors’ physicality. Chaplin managed to be ahead of his time in movies such as “The Immigrant”, or “The Great Dictator”, by taking extremely harsh and sensitive subjects, such as immigration and the Nazi regime, and managed to both satirize tyranny, and express his anguish with immigrating to a different country and express through comedy. Whether he was using dialogue to communicate, or hitting people with a cane, Chaplin undoubtedly set up the stage for intellectuals who’s intelligence was delivered to them by mother nature in the form of telling jokes. Whether it’s Sacha Baron Cohen, or Judd Apatow, comedy has been, and will always be a deep yet entertaining way of telling a story.
There are so many more comedies, and so many more sub-genres of comedy. Sacha Baron Cohen’s “Borat”, which innovated the genre, by being both ridiculously hilarious, and a dark reality of our society(and also it was fully unscripted). The Step-Brothers movies, which proves how funny physical comedy and silly concepts can be, any movie made from Saturday Night Live, such as Superstar, Tommyboy, Coneheads, etc, which prove how characters can be one of the funniest outlets out there, and finally parodies such as Austin Powers, and Space Ballz, which prove that sometimes it is ok to not take everything so seriously.
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