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Best Comedy Movies of the 1980s, Ranked by IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and TMDB
323 comedy films from the 1980s are in our catalog; the 50 best are ranked below. Top of the list is Back to the Future (1985), at 8.5 on IMDb. The average IMDb score across this list is 7.6. Biggest split between audiences and critics: Clue, 7.3 on IMDb against 41 on Metacritic.
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| # | Movie | Genre | IMDb | Tomato | Meta | TMDB | Director |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Back to the Future '1985 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 8.5 | 93% | 88 | 8.3 | Robert Zemeckis |
| 2 | The Princess Bride '1987 | Fantasy / Comedy / Romance | 8.0 | 93% | 78 | 7.7 | Rob Reiner |
| 3 | The Blues Brothers '1980 | Musical / Comedy / Action | 7.9 | 72% | 60 | 7.7 | John Landis |
| 4 | Ghostbusters '1984 | Comedy / Fantasy | 7.8 | 95% | 71 | 7.5 | Ivan Reitman |
| 5 | A Christmas Story '1983 | Comedy | 7.9 | 87% | 77 | 7.2 | Bob Clark |
| 6 | Back to the Future Part II '1989 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 7.8 | 63% | 57 | 7.8 | Robert Zemeckis |
| 7 | The Breakfast Club '1985 | Comedy / Drama | 7.8 | 87% | 66 | 7.7 | John Hughes |
| 8 | Ferris Bueller's Day Off '1986 | Comedy | 7.8 | 85% | 61 | 7.6 | John Hughes |
| 9 | This Is Spinal Tap '1984 | Comedy / Musical | 7.9 | 98% | 92 | 7.4 | Rob Reiner |
| 10 | Brazil '1985 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 7.8 | 98% | 84 | 7.7 | Terry Gilliam |
| 11 | The King of Comedy '1982 | Drama / Comedy | 7.8 | 89% | 73 | 7.8 | Martin Scorsese |
| 12 | Airplane! '1980 | Comedy | 7.7 | 97% | 78 | 7.3 | Jerry Zucker |
| 13 | The Goonies '1985 | Comedy | 7.7 | 77% | 62 | 7.5 | Richard Donner |
| 14 | Who Framed Roger Rabbit '1988 | Fantasy / Animation / Comedy / Crime | 7.7 | 96% | 83 | 7.5 | Robert Zemeckis |
| 15 | When Harry Met Sally... '1989 | Comedy / Romance / Drama | 7.7 | 90% | 76 | 7.4 | Rob Reiner |
| 16 | The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! '1988 | Comedy / Crime | 7.6 | 88% | 76 | 7.3 | David Zucker |
| 17 | Hannah and Her Sisters '1986 | Comedy / Drama | 7.8 | 92% | 90 | 7.5 | Woody Allen |
| 18 | Evil Dead II '1987 | Horror / Comedy / Fantasy | 7.6 | 89% | 72 | 7.5 | Sam Raimi |
| 19 | Planes, Trains and Automobiles '1987 | Comedy | 7.6 | 93% | 72 | 7.3 | John Hughes |
| 20 | Trading Places '1983 | Comedy | 7.5 | 87% | 69 | 7.2 | John Landis |
| 21 | An American Werewolf in London '1981 | Comedy / Horror | 7.5 | 80% | 55 | 7.4 | John Landis |
| 22 | A Fish Called Wanda '1988 | Comedy / Crime | 7.5 | 96% | 80 | 7.2 | Charles Crichton |
| 23 | National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation '1989 | Comedy | 7.5 | 72% | 49 | 7.2 | Jeremiah S. Chechik |
| 24 | Monty Python's The Meaning of Life '1983 | Comedy | 7.5 | 86% | 72 | 7.3 | Terry Jones |
| 25 | Beetlejuice '1988 | Fantasy / Comedy | 7.4 | 83% | 71 | 7.4 | Tim Burton |
| 26 | After Hours '1985 | Comedy / Thriller / Drama | 7.6 | 90% | 89 | 7.5 | Martin Scorsese |
| 27 | Beverly Hills Cop '1984 | Comedy / Crime / Action | 7.4 | 83% | 66 | 7.2 | Martin Brest |
| 28 | Down by Law '1986 | Crime / Drama / Comedy | 7.7 | 85% | 75 | 7.4 | Jim Jarmusch |
| 29 | Midnight Run '1988 | Comedy / Crime / Thriller | 7.5 | 95% | 78 | 7.2 | Martin Brest |
| 30 | Crimes and Misdemeanors '1989 | Comedy / Drama / Crime | 7.8 | 92% | 77 | 7.4 | Woody Allen |
| 31 | Tootsie '1982 | Comedy / Romance | 7.4 | 91% | 88 | 7.2 | Sydney Pollack |
| 32 | Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears '1980 | Drama / Comedy / Romance | 8.0 | 40% | - | 7.5 | Vladimir Menshov |
| 33 | Eddie Murphy: Delirious '1983 | Comedy | 8.1 | 83% | - | 7.6 | Bruce Gowers |
| 34 | Zelig '1983 | Comedy | 7.6 | 97% | - | 7.4 | Woody Allen |
| 35 | My Dinner with Andre '1981 | Drama / Comedy | 7.6 | 93% | 83 | 7.5 | Louis Malle |
| 36 | Gremlins '1984 | Fantasy / Horror / Comedy | 7.3 | 86% | 70 | 7.1 | Joe Dante |
| 37 | The Purple Rose of Cairo '1985 | Fantasy / Comedy / Romance | 7.6 | 93% | 75 | 7.4 | Woody Allen |
| 38 | Big '1988 | Fantasy / Drama / Comedy | 7.3 | 98% | 73 | 7.2 | Penny Marshall |
| 39 | Terms of Endearment '1983 | Drama / Comedy | 7.4 | 81% | 79 | 7.1 | James L. Brooks |
| 40 | Dirty Rotten Scoundrels '1988 | Comedy / Crime | 7.4 | 89% | 68 | 7.1 | Frank Oz |
| 41 | Victor/Victoria '1982 | Musical / Comedy / Romance | 7.6 | 85% | 84 | 7.3 | Blake Edwards |
| 42 | National Lampoon's Vacation '1983 | Comedy | 7.3 | 94% | 55 | 7.1 | Harold Ramis |
| 43 | Good Morning, Vietnam '1987 | Comedy / Drama / War | 7.3 | 90% | 67 | 7.3 | Barry Levinson |
| 44 | Raising Arizona '1987 | Comedy / Crime | 7.3 | 91% | 69 | 7.1 | Joel Coen |
| 45 | Tampopo '1985 | Comedy | 7.9 | 100% | 87 | 7.8 | Jūzō Itami |
| 46 | Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown '1988 | Comedy / Drama | 7.5 | 94% | 85 | 7.4 | Pedro Almodóvar |
| 47 | Withnail & I '1987 | Comedy / Drama | 7.5 | 84% | 87 | 7.2 | Bruce Robinson |
| 48 | The Gods Must Be Crazy '1980 | Action / Comedy | 7.3 | 86% | 73 | 7.3 | Jamie Uys |
| 49 | Clue '1985 | Comedy / Crime / Mystery | 7.3 | 73% | 41 | 7.2 | Jonathan Lynn |
| 50 | Caddyshack '1980 | Comedy | 7.2 | 73% | 48 | 6.6 | Harold Ramis |
Our catalog covers roughly the 8,800 most-rated films on TMDB, so lesser-known titles may be missing. Order uses a confidence-weighted IMDb score so a perfect score from a handful of votes does not beat a well-established classic; the scores shown are the raw ones.
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Other genres in the 1980s
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Directors on this list
Robert Zemeckis Rob Reiner John Landis Ivan Reitman Bob Clark John Hughes Terry Gilliam Martin Scorsese Jerry Zucker Richard Donner David Zucker Woody Allen
Actors on this list
Michael J. Fox Christopher Lloyd Cary Elwes Robin Wright Dan Aykroyd Bill Murray Emilio Estevez Matthew Broderick Michael McKean Jonathan Pryce Robert De Niro Jerry Lewis