With all this time on your hands, it may be time to break out some popcorn and revisit some of the classic movies from your childhood. In fact, there’s no need to feel guilty about watching movies all day or your lack of socialization! By staying home, you are saving lives. Here are our picks for 15 great classic comedy movies to watch while staying home.
1. 80s Comedy Movies – Ghostbusters
Who you gonna call? Ghostbusters! You may have heard of the newer remake in 2016, but the original film was released in 1984. The original Ghostbusters tells a story of three parapsychology professors who were recently fired from their job at Columbia University due to their paranormal shenanigans. They then start a business to capture and contain ghosts. Don’t worry, despite being a movie about ghosts, it’s not a scary movie. It is a comedic 80s comedy movies and will be sure to give you some laughs. If you feel like having a Ghostbusters marathon, you can watch both of the original movies and then the newer 2016 version! Although the characters have changed, they still have the same tagline: They ain’t afraid of no ghost!
2. Short Circuit
If you’re into sci-fi or robot movies, try this 1986 film. One robot in a group of experimental military robots goes haywire after being struck by lightning. This lightning gives him intelligence and escapes from the lab it was created in. Its name is Number 5 due to being the fifth prototype in the factory. With the help of a kind animal caregiver, Number 5 learns about the world it is in. NOVA, Number 5’s laboratory, wants the robot back in order to disassemble and rebuild the experiment that went wrong. However, because of Number 5’s development of humanlike feelings, it fears disassembly and equates it to dying. If you’ve already seen this one and loved it, we recommend the sequel as well!
3. Caddyshack
Caddyshack is a movie about the preposterous situations that happen at an upscale exclusive golf country club. The main character, Danny Noonan, is working as a caddie so he can save money to go to college. The country club has to deal with an assortment of problems including a new member who is quite full of himself and a gopher who is wreaking havoc on the golf course. This sports comedy film was released in 1980, but perhaps not one to watch with the kids (Rated R for sex, nudity, and some drug and smoking references and scenes).
4. Airplane!
No comedy movie list is complete without this quotable classic, Airplane! It is meant to be a parody of disaster movies such as Zero Hour and Airport 1975. Ted Striker is an ex-fighter pilot with PTSD from his time in the war. Ted has a hard time holding down a job and his girlfriend, Elaine Dickinson, wants to call it quits on their relationship. Elaine is a flight attendant and has a flight to catch, so Ted buys a ticket for that flight as a passenger in an attempt to win her back. Disaster occurs as the pilots fall ill and the man who is afraid to fly is responsible for getting them all to safety.
5. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Ferris Bueller is a high school student who has an extensive plan to get a day off from school. The day of hooky includes hanging out with his best friend and girlfriend while driving around Chicago in a borrowed Ferrari. Ferris Bueller’s high school principal, Ed Rooney, is convinced that Bueller is faking an illness and wants to catch Bueller on his day off. Bueller needs to avoid getting caught and also needs to get home before his parents do at the end of the day. Who wouldn’t love to watch this movie? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?
6. Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure
Bill and Ted are two teens who have a history presentation to do for school. They need a good grade on the project to avoid failing the class and failing out of school. And of course, what better way to make a great presentation than to do a little bit of time traveling?
A man from the future named Rufus comes to help Bill and Ted with their report so they can stay together. Rufus helps them use a time machine to find the historical people for their report. This classic comedy came out right at the tail end of the ’80s, in 1989. Bill is played by Alex Winter and Ted is played by Keanu Reeves.
7. Coming to America
Eddie Murphy stars in the 1988’s Coming to America film as an African prince named Akkem from the fictional country of Zamunda who is looking for a wife. Rejecting the tradition of marrying a woman via an arranged marriage, he travels to Queens, New York and disguises himself as a normal man to find himself a woman who will love him for who he really is and not his social status.
8. Back to the Future
Back to the Future is one of the most well-known 80s comedy movies of all time. This 1985 classic tells a story of high school student Marty McFly who travels back in time using a time machine created by a mad scientist named Doc Brown. He goes back 30 years but is unable to go back due to lack of fuel for the time machine. Marty finds the 1955 Doc Brown and tries to think of a strategy as to how he can get back to the future. Unfortunately, Marty realizes that he altered the future by interacting with the moment his mom and dad met, which would prevent Marty from ever being born. He needs to set them up so they can meet, fall in love, and have kids so his future won’t be changed. If you like this movie, there is Back to the Future II and III that are held in 2015 and 1885, respectively. It is definitely an interesting watch to see what the movie makers thought 2015 would look like back in 1989.
9. Trading Places
Randolph and Mortimer Duke are brothers who own a brokerage firm in Philadelphia. The two brothers have conflicting views on the power of nature versus nurture and create a sort of experiment to switch the lives of two people who differ greatly in the social hierarchy. Living seemingly opposite lives, successful businessman Louis Winthrope and homeless street hustler Billy Ray Valentine, switch lives due to the commodities brokerage firm owners’ bet. 1983 Trading Places is a modern take of Mark Twain’s The Prince and the Pauper. This is another movie that is better to watch without the kids due to its sex, nudity, and drug references.
10. Beverly Hills Cop
A young and reckless cop named Axel works as a detective in Detroit’s Police Department. His zany antics have him on the brink of being fired. Tragedy strikes when his best friend Mikey comes to visit him in Detroit. Mikey is murdered and Axel’s request to investigate Mikey’s murder is denied due to his relationship with the murder victim. Thus Axel travels to Mikey’s hometown in Beverly Hills to investigate by himself. Originally from Detroit, he is a fish out of the water while investigating the murder of his best friend in Beverly Hills.
11. Stripes
1981 Stripes begins with John Winger and Russell Ziskey, who are two friends and both bored with their current jobs. They decide to enlist in the army, thinking it will be fun. To their surprise, basic training is extremely hard for them. Their platoon bumbles through graduation and is then assigned to an EM-50 mission in Italy. John and Russell decide to take the EM-50 for a joy ride to visit their girlfriends in Germany. As you can probably guess, things don’t go exactly as they planned. The movie stars Bill Murray, John Candy, Harold Ramis, and other iconic actors and actresses of this generation.
12. Planes Trains and Automobiles
1987 blessed us with Planes, Trains & Automobiles. Steve Martin stars in a film about a man named Neal Page who wants to get home to Chicago for Thanksgiving. His flight from New York to Chicago is canceled and Neal must find other means of transport to return home. He meets Del Griffith, an annoying shower curtain ring salesman, who wants to help him make it home for Thanksgiving. They try every form of transportation that could be thought of and everything that might go wrong does.
13. Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Here’s a classic 80s comedy movies that you and your kids will love! This 1988 film is a live-action animated story about a cartoon rabbit who is accused of murdering a wealthy businessman. Detective Eddie Valiant is hired to help prove Roger Rabbit’s innocence but is conflicted in helping a toon due to his mistrust of toons after one killed his brother. This is one of the first films to meld live-action and animation and do it well! It was also the most expensive movie made at the time of its release in 1988. Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd and Joanna Cassidy star in the movie, with Charles Fleischer as Roger Rabbit’s voice.
14. 80s comedy movies – Weird Science
Gary Wallace and Wyatt Donnelly are two high school students who are unpopular, nerdy and excel in computer programming. They decide to create the perfect woman using their computer who turns real when a lightning storm hits. They want the woman to help them become confident, well-liked men by their peers and mostly by members of the opposite sex. This 1985 movie was directed by John Hughes, who also directed Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club, and follows his typical high school classic comedy genius.
15. Spies Like Us
Emmitt Fitz-Hume and Austin Milbarge are two low-level government employees who want to move up in the ranks and become secret agents. They attempt to cheat on their foreign service exam but are then selected as United States spies on a mission for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Unfortunately, they are only decoys to confuse Russian Spies during a Nuclear War, distracting the enemy from the actual selected CIA secret agents.
These are only a handful of the classic 80s comedy movies. It was a great decade for film and one list couldn’t possibly fit them all! Do you think we missed some of your favorite movies?
Let us know in the comments below.
