Live Poll: Comedy Types

Okay, Wikipedia will be my friend. 

What kind of comedy is Pulp Fiction?

I don’t think of “Pulp Ficton” as a comedy at all. I think it was meant to be exactly what the title meant it to be: a collection of lurid detective and crime stories. They were just all interconnected crime stories in the film. And the story of the two bumbling hit men was used as comic relief to offset the the rest of the tension of the rest of the stories. I mean after the story with the hit men, do you see anything funny in the rest of the stories? No. In fact, John Travolta’s performance as Vincent Vega was basically him reprising his ”Welcome Back, Kotter” role of Vinnie Barbarino (aka Vinnie Barbarino grew up to become the hit man Vincent Vega - the airhead dumbness Of the character are that similar).
In fact, I am reminded of another pair of hit men who cracked jokes while doing there job. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066995/...
Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint from Diamonds Are Forever (1971). That movie is not a comedy but they were cracking jokes much darker than Vincent Vega and Jules Winnfield were. Hmmm face off between the two? Nah too obvious. Someone probably already thought of it and did it by now. But maybe not?

I removed it :)

Actually Tarantino has gone on record numerous times that he intended Pulp Fiction to be comedy, to the point that he suggested it should be under that section in the video store. 

I'd be inclined to agree with Tarantino, but the counterpoint, with no offense to him meant, is that he is a very sick man. Haha. Some of the stuff he might find hilarious, only maybe one tenth of the humanity overall would also find to be hilarious, a large enough portion that I wouldn't feel comfortable psychoanalyzing "them" (perhaps myself included), yet here I am. There is no need to fix the "sickness". It may not be a genuine a defect. His work is suitable for broad grow-up audiences, but only a portion of that audience would appreciate the work in the same or a similar way that he does. Most of the subject material of Pulp Fiction is downright horrifying, if looked at outside of, say, a prism of desensitization. We are supposed to do the opposite of suspending disbelief in these cases, or at least remember and appreciate the fact "it's just a movie" ("and thank goodness for that"), for the sake of remaining sane. Regardless, comic violence is a legitimate part of aestheticization of violence, and thereby it cannot be much worse than the encompassing concept, for those who are not too pleased about violence (whether reenactment or fantastical) in media in general.

What about "absurdist comedy" such as The Ten? I suppose it is a variation of satire except far more awkward, at least in terms of the way The Ten manifests.

Satirizing is one of the intent of spoof movies but not the major one, all classic spoof movies are generally imitating an original work for the sake of laughs. So I think it's fair to distinguish between satire and spoof (or parodies).

Horror comedy can be categorized either under black comedy or spoof, so it would be redundant to add it. In fact, with the exception of action comedy, romantic comedy and dramedy, all other hybrid comedies will cross over the initial subgenres, for instance, I like your "fish out of water" idea and it actually includes each of the two "military" and "fantasy" examples, if "Stripes" isn't "fish out of water", it can be regarded as "anarchic"... "Back to the Future" is a sci-fi comedy but it can also be regarded as either an action or "fish out of water" comedy.

Overlapping is inevitable but I try to avoid it as much as possible.

Blended-type "parody" could be a category onto itself, yet there is no phrase for it.

• Airplane,
• Top Secret!,
• Spaceballs,
• The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!,
• I'm Gonna Git You Sucka,
• Hot Shots,
• Loaded Weapon 1,
• Robin Hood: Men in Tights,
• Mafia!,
• Scary Movie,
• Supernatural Activity,
• Superfast!,
• or...
  

...movies of styles adopted/inspired by Lloyd Bridges, Mel Brooks, Leslie Nelson, Dom DeLuise and Marlon Wayans (new kid on the block), all have a very specific style of blending parody, satire, absurdity, literalness and screwball, even incorporating a small amount of slapstick or cartoon-like bullshit. The aforementioned examples are mostly definitely parodies but there are also some movies with the same style that aren't exactly parodies. For instance, it's not clear what movie Airplane is a parody of, but it is possibly a parody of 1950s television ads by airlines. These movies belong to the same category, and they more extreme (more absurd) than, say, The Blues Brothers, Police Academy, Major Payne, Canadian Bacon, Bushwhacked or Liar Liar, which belong to a slightly different category. (I can't even begin to figure out were Jim Varney's work fits into all this.) I've been trying for decades to figure out a way to describe the various kinds of comedy movies. By giving enough examples, people should be able to figure out what I mean, though.

“ For instance, it's not clear what movie Airplane is a parody of, but it is possibly a parody of 1950s television ads by airlines. ”
That answer is obvious if you look at the movies of that period. The late sixties and the 1970’s was the period for disaster movies.
- The Last Voyage (1960)
- Voyage to the Bottom Of the Sea (1961)
- The Poseidon Adventure (1972)
- The Towering Inferno (1974)
- Earthquake (1974)
And the series Of movies based on Alex Hailey’s bestselling novel “Airport”.
- Airport (1970) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065377/...
- Airport 1975 (1974) That is not a typo. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071110/ it is were the sunglasses, the autopilot, and nuns singing on the plane jokes were inspired by. Don’t believe me? Watch the film’s trailer https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071110/...
- Airport '77 (1977) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075648/
- The Concorde... Airport '79 (1979) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078740/

“Airplane!” Was released in 1980 and was obviously parodying disaster movies and the Airport series in particular .

You can possibles your consider “The High and the Mighty”, “Island In the Sky”, and 1965 orginnal Of “The Flight of the Phoenix” too. But the safe bet is the Airport disaster movies.

"For instance, it's not clear what movie Airplane is a parody of, but it is possibly a parody of 1950s television ads by airlines."

Most of the plot and the central characters (along with the name "Ted Stryker") are taken directly from "Zero Hour!" (1957). Though "Airplane!" changed the setting of the film from Canada to the United States. The role of Ted Stryker was played by Dana Andrews. 

"Zero Hour!" was itself a film adaptation of the teleplay (theatrical play written and produced for television) "Flight into Danger" (1956) by writer Arthur Hailey (1920-2004). Hailey was a retired military pilot for the Royal Air Force (RAF), and a World Wat II veteran. So a story about a traumatized combat pilot was typical for him.

In the original teleplay, "Ted Stryker " was named "George Spencer". The character was played by actor James Doohan, who was chosen for the role because he was himself a retired military pilot and World War II veteran. 

Actually I got the name wrong. Guess who wrote “Airport”. The same writer. Arthur Hailey. Go ahead check. I’m right on it. He also wrote “Hotel” too. His trademark was epic spectacular themes.
Are you trying to tell me this scene from Airplane! Isn’t parody the nun playing the guitar for the sick girl in “Airport 75” compare it to the clip in my last post. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5pXFo14...
They may had taken the character of “Ted Stryker” from “Zero Hour” but the rest was all from the “Airport” franchise.

In "Zero Hour!", has-been pilot Ted Stryker joins Cross-Canada Air Lines Flight 714 in an attempt to reconcile with his wife Ellen Stryker, who has recently left him and wants a divorce. 

The fish served on the plane as a meal was tainted, and several passengers and crew are suffering from food poisoning in mid-flight.  Both the pilot and co-pilot are seriously ill, and someone has to fly the airplane. Stryker is the only other pilot on board, though he has not piloted anything since the Royal Canadian Air Force kicked him out for getting much of fighter squadron killed. His former superior Captain Martin Treleaven is called back on duty to give Stryker flight instructions through the radio.


Sounds familiar? As for Arthur Hailey, his trademark as a sceenwriter and novelist was depicting "ordinary people involved in extaordinary situations in a business or industry which is described in meticulous detail". He had a reputation for doing extensive research before writing any novel: "His research was painstaking: he read 27 books about the hotel industry for Hotel, he spent months at a Detroit car plant for Wheels, and he spent time—at the age of 67—with rebel guerillas in the jungles of Peru for The Evening News. "

Adaptations of his works were largely responsible for starting the "disaster film" genre. 

Some we are both agreeing that “Airplane!” Is a parody of disaster movies, particularly airplane disasters. films, specially those based on the novels or plays by Arthur Hailey. We just disagree on which work.
But here is something that ties your argument closer to mine because when the object being parodied is ether a) currently well known and popular or b) older works works are that very well known, so that audience can immediately recognize what is being parodied. “Zero Hour!” was not that well known while the “Airport” films was still fresh in the general public at the time “Airplane!” was made in 1980. Now here is the part that ties our arguments together with “the currently popular” part. In 1971, just after the movie “Airport” was released in 1970, a made for TV movie was aired on “ABC’s Tuesday Night Movie Of the Week” television series. It was Terror In the Sky. Guess whose novel and screenplay was used for that film. You guessed it is you had said Arthur Hailey’s television play Flight into Danger (1956) which was adapted from his novel “Runway Zero-Eight”. It was considered a remake of “Zero Hour!” (Isn’t funny how TV movies that used the same story that was made earlier as a film are considered as a “Remake.” But not the other way around? A cinema movie is not considered as make of a television show or TV movie if the television show was first.) anyway, that places that particular story squarely in the middle of the disaster film vogue of the 1970’s which “Airplane!” parodies. Clearly, Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, Jerry Zucker, the people who wrote the script for “Airplane!”. did their research into Hailey and found out about these two films and decided include the exclamation mark from “Zero Hour!” into the title of “Airplane!”. But as I said, there jokes and scenes in “Airplane!”, that are straight from the “Airport” franchise.

I like that...

"How about “Comic Relief”? My description of it. “Comedy or wisecrack or aside inserted into a non comedy play or movie in order to temporarily relieve or lessen the tension of the story and give the audience a short break.” "

The trope was also used in theatrical plays, with comical scenes in tragic plays. For example in  "Hamlet" (c. 1599) by William Shakespeare, a scene where Claudius plots to murder his nephew and Ophelia's suicide is announced, is followed by one where two gravediggers are cracking jokes and playing riddles while working. Though the jokes themselves are gallows humor:

Gravedigger:

*What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?

Other
*The gallows-maker, for that frame outlives a thousand tenants.

And later in the scene:

Gravedigger

*And when you are asked this question next, say “A grave-maker.” The houses that he makes last till doomsday. 

VIS COMICA!