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The French have a strong affinity for Woody Allen and Jerry Lewis. The British are known for their caustic humor. Australians have a tendency to embrace the risqué. Additionally, Indian jokes tend to be lighthearted.
Not a single French critic cast a vote for Annie Hall, the best Woody Allen picture.
Many film critics consider these clichés to be unalterable realities. However, a different picture emerges from the votes cast in BBC Culture’s 100 best comedies of all time poll. Annie Hall was number three overall, although none of the seven French critics surveyed ranked it in their top 10; the only Allen picture that received votes from two of the critics was Zelig. Annie Hall proved to be popular among the British, as evidenced by the fact that one-third of UK critics ranked the movie highly. (And The Ladies Man, a Jerry Lewis movie, received only one vote from a French critic.) The very chaste silent classic The General by Buster Keaton would have been rated number one if we had just looked at the opinions of the six critics from Australia and New Zealand. Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, the one Indian comedy that came dangerously close to breaking into the top 100, is a dark and biting parody of government corruption, partly inspired by Michelangelo Antonioni’s exceedingly unfunny Blow-Up.
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So discard those preconceived notions. However, examining the results of the voting by nation or area, it seems that another cliché is valid: certain jokes are just incomprehensible. Even if everyone laughs, our sense of humor varies greatly depending on our background, language, and most known historical period. For example, only critics from South Asia voted for Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro. A Chinese Odyssey Part Two: Cinderella only garnered votes from critics in East Asia, therefore it didn’t even come close to making the top 100. Nevertheless, it ranked eleventh among those critics. Furthermore, critics from nations where English is not the primary language tended to support non-English films significantly more frequently.
Paramount Pictures The dialogue-driven humor and frequent allusions to US popular culture in Airplane! may account for its greater appeal in the Americas than elsewhere. (Source: Paramount)Paramount Pictures
The dialogue-driven humor and frequent allusions to US popular culture in Airplane! may account for its greater appeal in the Americas than elsewhere. (Source: Paramount)
It seems like a lot of the movie Airplane! was lost in translation. How can one craft a joke that is as timeless as “Surely, you can’t be serious”?Is there any language other than English where the phrase “I am serious, and don’t call me Shirley” has the same impact? Perhaps this explains why Airplane! dropped to number seven in the final standings yet ranked third among US and Canadian critics. The large volume of Latin American reviewers who voted in favor of the language barrier theory, however, calls into question that theory; possibly the region’s proximity to Hollywood and US culture in general suffices to negate the language barrier. In any case, the likelihood of voters supporting Airplane! in the Americas was nearly four times higher than that of voters in any other region.
In a similar vein, critics across Europe voted for Withnail and I nearly 6.6 times more frequently than critics worldwide. Not only did UK cinema reviewers cast their votes for the movie, but also critics from Estonia, Russia, Romania, and Ireland.
Divulging laughter
Asiatic critics were especially fond of silent films, indicating that the lack of a linguistic barrier helps these strictly visual productions to cross national and cultural boundaries with more ease. The General, a feature-length train chase film starring Buster Keaton, ranked number 10 overall but second among critics in both East and South Asia. Undoubtedly, it’s among the greatest action films ever made, and it has a lot in common with Hong Kong’s dynamic action cinema. Jackie Chan has been referred to as the modern-day Buster Keaton a lot during the last 30 years.
Opponents from the US and Canada chose Dr. Strangelove as their alternative number one.
Modern Times was ranked 12th overall, but first in South Asia. But regardless of language, feeling and struggle are major themes in Indian cinema, two things Chaplin used to great effect. Gandhi, who advocated for Indian independence, told Chaplin in an early 1930s interview that industrial automation and the resulting unemployment was one of the biggest risks to the modern era. This suggestion gave rise to the concept for Modern Times. Despite the fact that Chaplin was from the UK, Modern Times did not obtain a single vote from a British critic. Instead, critics from South and East Asia were four times more likely to support Chaplin’s film than critics from any other region.
Standard Criteria Perhaps since silent cinema cuts over all linguistic boundaries, critics in East and South Asia gave silent pictures very high marks.
Perhaps since silent cinema cuts over all linguistic boundaries, critics in East and South Asia gave silent pictures very high marks.
Next, we have the competition for first place overall. Billy Wilder, a Polish-Jewish immigrant who broke Hollywood taboos with his film Some Like It Hot, won top honors due to the extraordinary support the film received from European critics. Of all the critics in Europe, 60% voted for the film, and European critics were four times more likely to vote for Some Like It Hot than any other critic. Just 26% of the 86 critics from the US and Canada supported it, compared to 33% of the critics from the Americas as a whole, due to the fact that it also garnered substantial support from East Asia and Latin America. In the end, Dr. Strangelove would have been the top movie on the list if those 86 critics had been voting for a different number one.
It’s interesting to note that critics from Eastern Europe were significantly more likely to vote for Dr. Strangelove than those from Western Europe. Perhaps this is why Dr. Strangelove is so beloved in the US and other former Iron Curtain nations—it brutally mocks the grandiosity fantasies of both camps. (Much like how critics in Eastern Europe, the region where many of Hitler’s worst crimes were committed, enthusiastically embraced Chaplin’s Hitler satire The Great Dictator.)
It’s also possible that the reason why European critics enjoy Some Like It Hot more than US ones is that, despite being a Hollywood production, it has a decidedly European vibe and perspective on sexuality. After all, Wilder started his career in the free-wheeling German cinema business of the 1920s before the Nazis drove him to flee to America. It makes sense that he would direct a movie in Some Like It Hot that would contribute to the relaxation of the stringent production code that had long limited what Hollywood filmmakers were allowed to show.
In the end, it comes down to this: everyone enjoys laughing. Just not about the same topics all the time.