This week’s release of A Million Ways to Die in the West made me think about the unusual genre-crossing of westerns and comedies, and how rarely it’s been done. However, in looking it up, I was surprised to find it was not quite as rare as I imagined. Of course I immediately think of Blazing Saddles and Back to the Future Part III, which both made it on this list, but IMDB reminded me of many movies I maybe forgot to classify as westerns, or forgot about entirely.
There were actually more than enough titles to rank the 10 best western-comedies ever, and I don’t even need to include the odd animated film Rango to make the quota. In fact, the 1994 Maverick remake is fun but didn’t quite make the cut of best ever. The Gold Rush is considered a western but it’s actually one of my least favorite Charlie Chaplin movies. Everyone remembers the dancing rolls, but the rest of the movie is very slow. I also used this assignment as an opportunity to do some homework on classic movies I had never seen, and virtually all of them made the list.
I want to give honorable mention to Wagon’s East which nobody saw because it was too depressing that John Candy died making it, but it’s got some funny parts and a pretty forward thinking gay hero for 1994. I actually don’t hate Wild Wild West either. For Men in Black in the west, it’s way more entertaining than the actual Men in Black sequel. But, I won’t subject you too many controversial picks. I already have one that’s even more controversial than if I had included Wild Wild West.
Fred Topel is a staff writer at CraveOnline and the man behind Best Episode Ever and The Shelf Space Awards. Follow him on Twitter at @FredTopel.
The Top 10 Western Comedies Ever-Ever
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10. Back to the Future Part III (1990)
Everyone loves this conclusion but it actually doesn’t work for me. After the ambitious twisting of things in Back to the Future Part II, which I was on board with back in 1989 when everyone hated it, they went back to just redoing Back to the Future I in a different era. That’s fine I suppose. You can always do a modern fish out of water, but it plays with different comic tensions. Where casual references like Pepsi Free and Tab were ironically misunderstood in 1955, wearing Nikes and doing the Moonwalk in the old west is just wildly anachronistic. I suppose it will always be funny showing modern things to old timey people, but it’s not satirical like the 1985/55 dichotomy was. It’s nice to see Doc and Marty around for the building of the clock tower, but there’s no tension to Marty meeting Sheamus McFly. It’s literally just there so Zemeckis can use technology to put two Michael J. Fox’s in a scene like he already did with the future McFly family in II. I don’t buy that there’s any finality to this conclusion either. Even if Doc hadn’t built a new time machine, his past and future selves would always be at play. We need Back to the Future IV to happen in the real 2015.
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9. The Beautiful Blonde from Bashful Bend (1949)
This one is Bibbs’ pick and I take his word for it. It’s Preston Sturges, with Betty Grable as a gun-toting saloon singer. The poster alone with Grable high kicking with two-fisted guns pointed in the air is priceless itself. Back in the late ‘40s, I imagine the sort of witty Vaudevillian banter a la the Marx Brothers with some fun poked at the old school John Ford westerns, perhaps some humorous deceptions a la Sturges’ Hail the Conquering Hero and a heartwarming message in the end?
[Editor's Note: This movie is hilarious, trust me.]
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8. Shanghai Noon (2000)
While Shanghai Noon is no classic, it was the first American movie to really get Jackie Chan. Rush Hour would be more popular, because I guess Americans prefer to make fun of Jackie Chan than to celebrate him, but Noon let Chan create clever action out of premises as simple as fighting two Native Americans in the woods. The movie kept it brief, because American audiences don’t like their fight scenes to be too awesome, but it was enough to let Chan be creative. Plus, it was always Chan’s dream to be a cowboy, and screenwriters Alfred Gough and Miles Millar finally gave him a premise that would allow for an Asian cowboy. His passion is contagious.
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7. City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly's Gold (1994)
After 20 years, I’m finally going to defend this unjustly maligned sequel that has become a punchline for any bad sequel subtitles. The City Slickers sequel actually forwards the characters via the same open range bonding that worked so well in the first one. Mitch (Billy Crystal) is over his midlife crisis, but now he’s dealing with grief over losing Curly (Jack Palance), and he also has to accept that his twin brother Duke (Palance) is not going to replace Curly. Bruno Kirby didn’t want to do the sequel, but bringing in John Lovitz as Mitch’s brother gives him more new family issues with which to deal. Okay, maybe Phil (Daniel Stern) is the same as before, but not everyone gets fixed in one cattle drive. Maybe this was all so subtle nobody noticed. It’s also another great adventure with all new thrills, and more hilarious and moving conversations on horseback.
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6. Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971)
This sequel to Support Your Local Sheriff, in which James Garner returns as a completely different character, is even sillier than its mildly charming predecessor. Bigger stunts, an explosive finale, puns about asses and lots of pratfalls totally eclipsed the predecessor in my mind and even edged it off this list entirely. However, there is one franchise with two entries on this list, you’ll see as you continue.
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5. Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970)
I didn’t exactly remember this as a comedy, but as one of Clint Eastwood’s lesser known westerns, I found it way more entertaining than the likes of Pale Rider or High Planes Drifter. I guess it’s a comedy because Eastwood and Shirley MacLaine are the bickering buddy duo. Oh yeah, Shirley MacLaine is in a Clint Eastwood western, so I guess that automatically makes it a comedy. Their chemistry is awesome and it’s an action packed romp I’d recommend even without any genre qualifiers.
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4. Cat Ballou (1965)
This was one of the classics I had to see to complete this list and boy, I’m glad I did. Jane Fonda is adorable as an innocent woman who becomes a badass gunfighter to avenge her father. Lee Marvin is great as the drunk gunslinger she hires. A lot of the jokes may seem old, but 49 years ago this may have been the first time they ever did them. The film is narrated with musical interludes by Nat “King” Cole and Stubby Kaye, and they are catchy tunes with funny rhymes. It’s a way better western musical than Paint Your Wagon, though there aren’t enough of those to make an entire list.
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3. ¡Three Amigos! (1986)
This ‘80s comedy classic was famously maligned when Siskel and Ebert criticized it on “The Tonight Show” while sharing a couch with Chevy Chase. It seems like the critics were being a little stuffy. This is three brilliant comedians at their peaks, with great chemistry and tons of quotable lines. “You son of a motherless goat.” “Our reward is that justice has been done.” The premise itself is funny, movie heroes mistaken for the real deal, and their western adventure is full of great set pieces like the singing bush, the canteens (rule of threes, always funny) and, yes, another dance number.
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2. City Slickers (1991)
The original City Slickers really hit on something special, captured the ‘90s zeitgeist and became such a modern classic that I guess no one could be satisfied by a sequel. Three men having midlife crises go on a cattle drive like they used to play as kids. They are, in fact, city slickers and botch the basics of roping and camping. Then the cattle drive turns into a real disaster, like Plains, Trains and Automobiles in the west, but it allows the three heroes to step up. Jack Palance won an Oscar for his role as crusty old cowboy Curly, whom they foolishly killed off not realizing this would become a franchise. As funny as City Slickers is, what makes it a classic is the heart, as the characters work through their issues on horseback. It’s meaningful, relatable and never cloying.
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1. Blazing Saddles (1974)
mean, come on. It’s one of the funniest movies of all time, so Blazing Saddles easily eclipses anything else on this list. Mel Brooks really created the spoof genre with this movie, and went on to apply it to Universal horror movies in Young Frankenstein, science fiction in Spaceballs and even silent movies in Silent Movie. Blazing was also a socially progressive film, satirizing racism when a black sheriff (Cleavon Little) comes to town. It was scathing, but also universal with some good old fart jokes. And it was meta, when the characters break out of the western movie in the climax.
