It’s been a rather quiet season for comedies, but 2024 has enough hilarious gems to round out a list. And there’s a wide variety of subgenres to choose from: musical reboots, existential animated kids’ movies, cheesy horror flicks, and even a DC parody.
So here are the best comedies of 2024. This list is updated throughout the year and sorted in reverse chronological order so that the newest films always appear first. Our last update added Space Cadet.
Image: Amazon Prime Video/Everett Collection
Where to watch: Prime Video
Space Cadet Emma Roberts plays Rex, a party girl from Florida who once dreamed of seeing the stars. Due to some real-life complications, she had to give up her dreams – until she got the chance to join NASA’s astronaut training program. The only problem? Her best friend may have embellished her resume a tiny bit more than she should have.
It is fun to see Rex alongside her more traditional, buttoned-up classmates, and is reminiscent of Naturally blonde and similar comedies. But it’s also super heartwarming to see her courage and heart rewarded as she faces the challenges of astronaut training with a sparkling twinkle in her eye. —Petrana Radulovic
Image: Neon/Courtesy Everett Collection
Where to watch: In cinemas from 17 May
Director Pamela Adlon (Better things) tells in detail about the ups and downs of pregnancy in Babiesbut the best part is the central relationship between two best friends. Eden (Ilana Glazer), a single yoga teacher, and Dawn (Michelle Buteau), a married dentist with two children, have been best friends for decades – and even though their life priorities are a little different now, they make time for each other.
Eden gets pregnant after a one-night stand and decides to have the baby. This is a new phase in their relationship, especially as Dawn struggles to balance her job, family and friendship with Eden, while Eden embarks on this scary journey of being a single mother. It’s hilarious, but also says a lot about the strain that adulthood puts on friendships. — PR
Image: Altered Innocence
Where to watch: Limited Theaters
Director star Vera Drew initially planned The People’s Joker as a found footage filmsplicing together clips from Joker’s past, present and future to create a new Jokerfied experience. Although the found footage element didn’t materialize, the end result (after a brief delay due to rights issues) is a breath of fresh, satirical air in our intellectual property-saturated landscape, part of a new wave of transgender films that is upending what mainstream audiences can experience in transgender films.
The People’s Joker cleverly uses DC canon as a basis for setting, as a way to explore gender roles, and for comedy by subverting expectations of these familiar characters. But my favorite part of the film is how Vera uses many different animation styles from many different creators to create a mixed media effect. It’s unlike anything else you’ll see this year. —Pete Volk
Image: Sony
The true story of Littlehampton poison letter scandal in 1923 is pretty depressing, another in a long line of reminders that justice systems rely on people’s judgment, and people are notoriously susceptible to prejudice, stereotypes and other forms of confirmation bias that get in the way of the truth. But Thea Sharrock’s lively (and heavily fictionalized) British comedy about the scandal treats these points with a light perspective that offers a little exhilaration and a lot of good humor. International pearl Olivia Colman (The favorite) plays Edith Swan, a pious working-class spinster who begins receiving obscene anonymous letters; Jessie Buckley is her neighbor Rose Gooding, a vulgar libertine who is accused of writing these letters – in an era when calling someone a “bloody ass whore” in writing was enough to warrant a prison sentence with hard labor.
The absolute shock and disbelief that Edith and Rose’s entire community feels when they see words like “asshole” in print is part of the humor here, but much more of it comes from Jonny Sweet’s brisk, tongue-in-cheek script, which keeps the action snappy and highlights the irony of an entire community full of hypocrites reveling in their self-righteous insult to the letters. (Any metaphor for today’s online communication is strictly intended.) Colman and Buckley’s performances add a great poignancy to the whole thing, but at heart this is an ensemble piece, and Anjana Vasan as a detective trying to navigate institutional sexism rounds out the cast for a lively, snappy tale that isn’t particularly believable as a story but is sure to go down well as a fun, engaging metaphor. —Tasha Robinson
Photo: Wilson Webb/Focus Features
Don’t be fooled if the only name you see in the credits is Coen. Drive-Away Dolls (or its original title, which still appears in the credits: Retractable dikes) has the same hilarious crime thriller spirit that characterizes all of the Coen brothers’ best early works.
Set in the ’90s, the film follows two lesbian friends (Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan) on an east coast road trip while two unsuspecting gangsters are hot on their heels. Equal parts excellent film about friends on the road and crime comedy. Drive-Away Dolls is an early contender for the title of most entertaining movie of 2024 and probably one that will be hard to beat. —Austen Goslin
Photo: Michele K. Short/Focus Features
Sometimes you just want to see Kathryn Newton running around in increasingly elaborate ’80s goth outfits while she and an undead Victorian musician kill people who have wronged her.
Lisa Frankenstein is a loving homage or parody of old kitschy horror comedies, and although the connecting fabric is somewhat lacking from scene to scene, the film is shockingly entertaining. —PR
Image: DreamWorks Animation
On its surface Orion and the Darkness seems like a typical fairytale children’s story about a frightened boy who meets the personification of darkness who helps him overcome his fears. But it takes a surprising turn when it turns out that this story is told by a grown-up version of the little boy to his daughter.
Not only is it a nice setting, but it’s also one that distorts the story and makes it (in the best sense) much stranger than it was at the beginning. —PR
Image: SRH
Where to watch: Fandor, free with library card on Hoopla or digital rental/purchase on Amazon And AppleTV
“What if Looney Tunes were for adults and filtered through video games and silent film slapstick?” That is the ingenious combination that Hundreds of beavers one of the most extraordinary films of the year, a pure expression of cinematic comedy that will have you screaming with laughter. The low-budget indie film follows Jean Kayak (Ryland Brickson Cole Twes), a trapper trying to survive in the harsh winter of the Great Lakes region. He is surrounded by hundreds of beavers (portrayed as humans in mascot costumes) who see him as a threat, and he must solve a series of problems and puzzles to survive and thrive in the harsh environment.
Despite its limited budget, the film is incredibly silly and packed to the brim with mind-blowing gags and special effects. Hundreds of beavers is the funniest movie I’ve seen in years. It’s the perfect antidote to what has been ailing mainstream American comedy for years by actually bringing back jokes and not just the tone of comedy. I highly recommend it. —PV
Photo: Jojo Whiden/Paramount Pictures
Where to watch: Outstanding Plus
Fans of the Broadway musical Girls Club – Be careful, they bite!based on the 2004 film Girls Club – Be careful, they bite!have understandably bristled at some of the changes in this adaptation, from the many songs cut from the Broadway version to the casting of protagonist Cady Heron. But while it’s an imperfect adaptation of the stage experience, it still stands on its own as a lively, creatively directed film that gives plenty of verve to its catchy, inviting musical numbers.
The performances are not intended to replace the 2004 version of the film: they are new interpretations, delivered with a lot of musical energy. This is an incredibly entertaining film that should send people home singing. —TR
Image: Hulu
Jake Johnson’s directorial debut is about a man who is so confused after a breakup that he agrees to take part in an underground reality competition in which he tries to survive for a month while killers try to kill him. But Independence is not the kind of manic thriller that the premise suggests; Johnson told Polygon it is much more of a mashup of two of his favorite films: Wes Anderson’s Bottle rocket and the Adrian Lyne thriller Jacob’s Ladder. It’s a strange combination of incredibly different projects that come together to create an offbeat indie comedy about human relationships and the humiliating ordeal of wanting to be known by people who have no interest in knowing you.
Produced by The Lonely Island and starring Andy Samberg, who plays himself in a rather funny cameo, Independence has the same dry humor and secret feelings as the group’s film Palm Springsbut with even lower stakes and even less predictable storytelling. It’s silly stuff, but it’s a pleasantly light story designed to keep the audience guessing. And it’s almost impossible to watch it without wondering: Would I do better under these circumstances? —TR
