Top ten best comedies of the 90s

http://www.cutprintfilm.com/features/the-50-best-comedies-of-the-90s/

The New York of today can be overwhelming, but it’s nothing compared to the New York of 20+ years ago. NYC then was dangerous. As a piece in Salon put it, “In the 1970s, ’80s and early ’90s, New York was viewed as one of the world’s most dangerous metropolises — a cesspool of violence and danger… Friends who lived here during that time talk of being terrified to use the subway, of being mugged outside their apartments, and an overwhelming tide of junkies. Thirty-one one of every 100,000 New Yorkers were murdered each year, and 3,668 were victims of larceny.”

Howard Franklin and Bill Murray’s 1990 film Quick Change was released at the cusp of big change in the city (as the 90s went on, the Big Apple would turn into a much safer place to inhabit). The genius of Quick Change lies in how it takes the potentially deadly chaos that the city had yet to crawl out of it and turn it into something hilarious. The film opens with a lengthy bank robbery-turned-hostage-standoff. Bill Murray plays the bank robber, who arrives on the scene in a full clown get-up. Eventually it’s revealed that two of Murray’s “hostages” — played by Geena Davis and Randy “Star Whackers” Quaid — were in on the job with him. And while the three criminals get away from the robbery unscathed, getting out of the city will prove to be much more difficult. Quick Change is often hilarious, but there’s a melancholy that layers the film that likely didn’t sit well with audiences expecting a riotous Bill Murray comedy (the film eventually made its budget back, but was considered an overall box office disappointment). Quick Change eventually earned the cult status it deserved, and remains one of the best comedies of 90s.

http://www.cutprintfilm.com/features/the-50-best-comedies-of-the-90s/