Wicked Wednesday: Movies that make you laugh

Hi all. In June the Wickeds are dreaming of Hollywood and talking about some of our favorite movies.

Sometimes we just need to laugh, and I mean belly laugh. When laughter is what you seek, what is your go-to favorite movies and why?

Jessie: I love A Fish Called Wanda. I always adore movies featuring John Cleese and his performance as a straight-laced solicitor whose life takes an exciting turn when he falls for Jamie Lee Curtis never fails to make me laugh.

Edith:  I’ll vote for just about any Marx Brothers movie: “Night at the Opera,” “Day at the Races,” you name it. Also,  and here’s another nod to John Cleese, Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” really cracks me up. When his mother says, “‘E’s not the Messiah, ‘e’s just a very nau’y [naughty] boy!” When the people are standing so far back they can’t hear him and they think he says, “Blessed are the cheesemakers.” When he’s running from his followers and loses a sandal and they stop and declare, “The shoe is the sign!” And on and on.

Liz: Ok, I’m really behind in my movie watching, so I have to go back to the 80s (but really, isn’t everything awesome from the 80s??) – “Adventures in Babysitting” with Elizabeth Shue. OMG, that movie never fails to crack me up, even today if I catch bits of it in reruns. It’s about a girl who gets stood up by her boyfriend on a Saturday night, so instead she goes to babysit for a family with a young daughter and a teenage boy who has a crush on her. But her best friend decides to run away from home and gets stranded at the bus station in downtown Chicago, so she has to go pick her up. And of course, everything that can go wrong…it’s freakin hilarious.

Barb: I loved A Fish Called Wanda and Adventures in Babysitting. One of my fondest memories is of seeing It’s a Mad Mad World in a theater in Manhattan with my grandparents. My little brother laughed so hard he got wedged between his seat and its back and had to be rescued by an usher. Now that’s a comedy. Just to prove that the Wickeds have laughed during the twenty-first century, I really loved 40 Year Old Virgin, Crazy Stupid Love, and Mean Girls.

Sherry: I loved Crazy Stupid Love and Mean Girls too, Barb. First, my oldest one — Young Frankenstein with Gene Wilder and Madeline Kahn. I can still recite lines from that movie. Jump ahead a decade to Jumpin’ Jack Flash with Whoopie Goldberg. The first 3/4 quarters of that movie are so funny, it makes me chuckle to think about it. And the end is sweet and romantic. I noticed when I looked to see what year it came out it’s called a action/thriller. It has elements of that too. My third pick is Saving Grace (2000) with Brenda Blethyn and Craig Ferguson. The blurb on IMDb says: A small-town English widow, facing financial troubles after her husband’s suicide, turns to agriculture of an illegal kind. This wouldn’t usually be my thing, but oh, my!

Julie: I love, love, love to laugh. In addition to many of these (A Fish Called Wanda–I haven’t seen that for years!) I have to add two Rob Reiner movies, Spinal Tap and The Sure Thing. I’d add When Harry Met Sally, but that isn’t belly laughs. Also, have to call out the genius that is Christopher Guest–Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, A Mighty Wind.  PS, Barb, I love the story of your brother laughing that hard.

Readers: What are your go-to movies when you really need a laugh?

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