The WGA’s List of 101 Funniest Screenplays Is the Rare Victory for 1980s Cinema

Woody Allen and Marshall Brickman’s script for the 1977 Oscar-winner Annie Hall was chosen #1 on the Writers Guild of America’s list of the 101 funniest screenplays. The film, which co-stars Allen and Diane Keaton, is often considered the director’s best, or at least among his best, and it features some of the most memorable bits in his entire filmography.

The rest of the WGA’s top 10: Some Like It Hot, Groundhog Day, Airplane!, Tootsie, Young Frankenstein, Dr. Strangelove, Blazing Saddles, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and Animal House. (Click on the movie title to find out where you can stream each of these movies.)

What was the funniest decade at the movies? The WGA’s list suggests that if you were in the moviegoing habit in the 1980s, you were around for the sweetest spot of movie comedy of all time. Obviously, this is a subjective list, and perhaps were just at the point where the majority of WGA members were at impressionable ages during the ’80s, but by the numbers, there were 28 movies on the list from the 1980s, by far the most represented decade. This marks a rare victory for the cinema of the ’80s, a decade that is often maligned for being a fallow period between the New Hollywood of the auteur-driven ’70s and the indie revolution of the ’90s. The ’80s get very little love from cinephiles, but it seems the comedy writers were at least on to something. (The 1990s came in second with 19 and the 1970s was third with 15, a bell curve that does seem to suggest some generational bias, yes.)

1987 and 1988 were particularly good years, according to the list. Five films from 1987 and six from 1988 made the list, the two most-represented years.

Here, in chronological order of release, are the funniest films from, according to the WGA, the 24 funniest movie months of all time:

Raising Arizona
Ranked: #23
Written by: Joel and Ethan Coen
Release date: 3/13/87
[Where to stream Raising Arizona]

The Princess Bride
Ranked: #22
Written by: William Goldman
Release date: 9/25/87
[Where to stream The Princess Bride]

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles
Ranked: #36
Written by: John Hughes
Release date: 11/25/87
[You can stream Planes, Trains and Automobiles on Netflix]

Broadcast News
Ranked: #51
Written by: James L. Brooks
Release date: 12/18/87
[Where to stream Broadcast News]

Moonstruck
Ranked: #70
Written by: John Patrick Shanley
Release date: 12/18/87
[Where to stream Moonstruck]

Big
Ranked: #44
Written by: Anne Spielberg and Gary Ross
Release date: 6/3/88
[Where to stream Big]

Coming to America
Ranked: #75
Written by: David Sheffield, Barry W. Blaustein, and Eddie Murphy
Release date: 6/29/88
[Where to stream Coming To America]

A Fish Called Wanda
Ranked: #20
Written by: John Cleese and Charles Crichton
Release date: 7/15/88
[Where to stream A Fish Called Wanda]

Midnight Run
Ranked: #46
Written by: George Gallo
Release date: 7/22/88
[Where to stream Midnight Run]

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad
Ranked: #42
Written by: Jerry Zucker, Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, and Pat Profit
Release date: 12/2/88
[Where to stream The Naked Gun]

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Ranked: #79
Written by: Dale Launer, Stanley Shapiro, and Paul Henning
Release date: 12/16/88
[Where to stream Dirty Rotten Scoundrels]