Many sites and comedy film books have attempted to compile listings of the funniest scenes or funniest comedy films in film history. In June, 2000, the American Film Institute named the Top 100 Funniest Films of the Century in their multi-part series of tributes -- 100 Years...100 Laughs. Although it would be impossible to compile a list of every single funny scene ever screened, this collection moves toward that goal. It should be obvious that a selection of funny movie moments and scenes is entirely subjective and can only scratch the surface.

See also this site's general introduction to the genre of Comedy Films. Premiere Magazine's selections of the 50 Greatest Comedies of All Time (in their July/August 2006 issue) are indicated by this symbol:

The following illustrated list in the next few web pages, in unranked alphabetical order, presents a solid collection of the most classic, 'funniest' scenes in movie history, including film scenes from the silent era, the classic comedies of the 30s (the Marx Brothers, Laurel and Hardy, etc.), through to some of the best comedies of today. Some are scenes from other genres (drama, horror, science-fiction, etc.) that provide comic relief. They include slapstick, parody, screwball comedies, romantic comedies, black comedies, satire, farce, and films with witty dialogue. Most of these suggested scenes are quotable, 'laugh-out-loud' funny, universally hilarious, and hold up for repeated viewings.

The scenes of a 13 year-old boy Josh Baskin (David Moscow) in the "big" body of a thirty-year-old man (Tom Hanks) after his wish to be "big" at a carnival machine comes true: his reaction to the hors d'oeuvres (miniature corn cobs) at a fancy office party; also his confused sexual relationship with sexy yuppie Susan (Elizabeth Perkins) - a top-level co-worker - especially their conversation during their apartment sleep-over scene (in bunk beds): Susan: "I want to spend the night with you." Josh: "Do you mean sleep over?" Susan: "Well... yeah!" Josh: "Well, okay... but I get to be on top!"; and the scene of a foot-tapping, giant floor-sized electronic piano duet of "Heart and Soul" with toy company executive MacMillan (Robert Loggia) in FAO Schwartz's main showroom

Big Business (1929)

The famous silent short (two-reeler) in which door-to-door Christmas tree salesmen Stan (Stan Laurel) and Ollie (Oliver Hardy) get into an escalating vindictive fight with a disgruntled homeowner (James Finlayson), and end up destroying his home and yard while he destroys their car (and tree), as a policeman and other neighbors calmly watch

A wacky, satirical crime caper about an amateurish, inept and incompetent group of Italians who plan the perfect crime that ultimately goes very wrong - the robbery of a pawnshop, masterminded by womanizing boxer Peppe (Vittorio Gassman) and accompanied by unemployed cameraless photographer and baby-minding Tiberio (Marcello Mastroianni), young rookie thief Mario (Renato Salvatori), hot-tempered Sicilian Ferribote (Tiberio Murgia), ex-jockey Capannelle (Carlo Pisacane) - and the gang's mentor Dante Cruciani (Italian stage star Toto) who offers ridiculous lessons on safecracking; the climactic scene of the break-in ends up being a complete failure

All of the film's political incorrectness, including the scene of near-sighted and dim-witted Governor Le Petomane's (Mel Brooks) nuzzling into bosomy secretary Miss Stein's (Robyn Hilton) cleavage while being advised by villainous and scheming attorney general Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman); also the scene of the new Rock Ridge Sheriff Black Bart's (Cleavon Little) warning to the townsfolk as he reaches down for his acceptance speech - to their gaspings: "Excuse me while I whip this out"; and the infamous gas-passing, bean-eating scene around the campfire by flatulent cowboys; the scene in which Mongo (Alex Karras) enters Rock Ridge riding an ox, then later knocks out a horse with a bare, single-fisted punch; and Madeline Kahn's exquisite parody of Marlene Dietrich's saloon singer "Frenchy" (from Destry Rides Again) as the "Teutonic Titwillow" - and her memorable phrase: "It's twue, it's twue" after unzipping sheriff Black Bart's (Cleavon Little) fly and examining his endowment in the dark; and the scene in which Hedley is recruiting men to assault the town - in which the gun-slinging Waco Kid (Gene Wilder) holds up Bart as bait for two Ku Klux Klan members so that they can steal their white robes - with Bart's mock-dumb (racially-stereotyped) taunt: "Hey! Where are the white women at?" - and more

The opening scene on a golf course in this screwball comedy in which mad-cap and scatter-brained heiress Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn) steals the ball (and car) of bumbling, bespectacled, and absent-minded paleontologist David Huxley (Cary Grant): ("I'll be with you in a minute, Mr. Peabody!"); the slapstick scene of David (with a ripped coat) gallantly helping Susan exit - in lock-step - from a country club restaurant with a torn dress -- and his statement to her: "Now it isn't that I don't like you, Susan, because after all, in moments of quiet I'm strangely drawn toward you, but well, there haven't been any quiet moments. Our relationship has been a series of misadventures from beginning to end..."; also David's sarcastic explanation as he leaps into the air for being dressed in a fluffy and frilly negligee (Susan's dressing gown) to her rich Aunt Elizabeth (May Robson): "Because I just went gay all of a sudden!" - and when she explains to her Aunt that David is a friend of her brother's from Brazil and that David is on the verge of a nervous breakdown, he quips: "I'm a nut from Brazil"; also David and Susan Vance's singing of the song: "I Can't Give You Anything But Love" to coax a tame pet leopard named Baby off a roof, the complications that derive from a case of mistaken leopard identity and the jail cell sceneand the finale with Susan dangling from a scaffolding next to a collapsing dinosaur skeleton; remade in homage as Peter Bogdanovich's What's Up, Doc? (1972) with Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neal

The scene of uncharismatic news writer Aaron Altman's (Albert Brooks) disastrous anchor debut and flop sweat attack, with one news producer humorously commenting: "This is more than Nixon ever sweated"; also the scene of reporter Jennifer Mack (Lois Chiles) playfully asking handsome but vacuous anchorman Tom Grunick (William Hurt) about his prominent penis shadow in silhouette: "Do you do bunny rabbits?"; also the scene of Aaron desperately trying to explain his love to young female producer Jane (Holly Hunter) -- when he accuses her media-friendly boyfriend Tom of being the Devil, and she retorts that Aaron is the Devil -- and he responds that her assertion is impossible: "Because I think we have the kind of friendship where if I were the Devil, you'd be the only one I could tell"; and the scene of wacky, frenetic assistant director Blair Litton's (Joan Cusack) painful rush to get a finished tape to the broadcast control booth - slipping on papers, jumping over a toddler, and slamming into a water fountain