List of films to cheer me up

[mrbasehart]

Commando also puts me in a good mood.

[MontyServo]

Amelie is almost made to put people in a good mood.

And I will also recommend a little seen gem from 2005 called Little Manhattan.  A cute little movie about first love.

[RoninFox]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

[Pak-Man]

I always find the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy movie puts me in a good mood. It's not my favorite adaptation, but it makes me happy.

James and the Giant Peach actually picked me up during one of the roughest times of my life. It's not that it's super-happy (It's not sad by a long shot) but that it's so surreal that it kind of swallows the blahs right up. It's also one of those movies where I feel like I'm the only person on earth who's ever seen it.

[Thrifty]

You could watch the nuclear war movie Threads.

[Thrifty]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

The first 3 are okay, but number 4 (Citizens on Patrol) was atrocious.  Number 7 (Mission to Moscow) makes me want to murder someone.

[Thrifty]

Requiem For A Dream

Actually, I find that watching movies about some of the most terribly suffering people helps me put my problems in perspective and helps me.  In contrast, watching anything about happy, successful people just leaves me envious and makes the situation worse.

This is, I think, why I call Marley and Me the worst movie I've ever seen.  Oh sure, the production values were good, the acting was good, and it had some talented big name stars.  However, the story just repulsed me.  You have a guy with a beautiful wife and a nice home who is experiencing greater and greater success in the journalism field whining about how unsatisfied he is.  Cry me a fucking river.  It also covers too much time (the movie spans 10-15 years), and all the conflicts are petty and small and get introduced and resolved too quickly.  The ending was sickeningly melodramatic too.

[Smith Dr John Smith]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

WHY DO YOU THINK I TOOK YOU TO ALL THOSE POLICE ACADEMY MOVIE?! FOR FUN?!  WELL I DIDN'T HEAR ANYONE LAUGHING!

[RVR II]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

I concur with these..

Just sayin

[RoninFox]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

The first 3 are okay, but number 4 (Citizens on Patrol) was atrocious.  Number 7 (Mission to Moscow) makes me want to murder someone.

Hmm. 4 is the only one I haven't rewatched recently. I remember really liking it when I was a kid though. Maybe I'd think differently watching it as an adult. I hated 5 and 6 from the start though. Amazing what a series can lose from the simple subtraction of Steve Gutenberg.

[Thrifty]

Any of the first four Police Academy movies.

Seriously, can't possibly be sad after I watch one of them.

Part 5 on the other hand...

The first 3 are okay, but number 4 (Citizens on Patrol) was atrocious.  Number 7 (Mission to Moscow) makes me want to murder someone.

Hmm. 4 is the only one I haven't rewatched recently. I remember really liking it when I was a kid though. Maybe I'd think differently watching it as an adult. I hated 5 and 6 from the start though. Amazing what a series can lose from the simple subtraction of Steve Gutenberg.

What I remember about Police Academy 4, having watched it 2 years ago, was that it includes a setup introducing the premise.  Then it's a series of gags, then in the last 15-20 minutes they decide there should be a plot so they set up a prison escape and a chase scene.  Most of the movie is just one scene after another of nothing but some shitty gag.  It's plotless and feels a lot like a sketch comedy show.

[Mrs. Dick Courier]

The last Police Academy I saw was 5.  Don't really remember much about any of them, remember liking the first 4.  I'll have to catch them again.

[SJP]

anything pixar, except for cars and cars 2.

I concur, but there are a few moments in some of them I'd fast forward if you're feeling blue.  Especially the beginning of Up.  Start at Chapter 2 or 3...you'll know what happened, believe me.

I have happy nostalgia for Big Trouble in Little China.  John Carpenter's most lighthearted movie has very little gore, lots of comedy, and Kurt Russell doing what would these days be called a "Bruce Campbell" impression.  Probably no coincidence the two ended up working in Escape From L.A. together, even if briefly.

If you're looking for something on the charming and whimsy end of the spectrum, I say Hugo.  I didn't go to see this in the theater, but now I wish I had...despite what looks like a bunch of sad moments, it is in fact uplifting, pleasant, funny, and cinema at its best.  How it lost to The Artist I'll never know.

And even if Police Academy 4 is stupid, I still like it.  When you think about it, only 2, 5, and 6 really had any lead up to the ending caper...even the first movie pulled the big riot out of nowhere in the third act.  And 5 & 6, while terrible, I didn't mind so much watching some years after Mission to Moscow came out.  If you think Gutenberg's absence is bad, imagine G.W. Bailey running around with no Proctor to play off of.  Eesh.

[RoninFox]

I watched Mission to Moscow only once.  I have almost no memory of it except that they had by then degraded into such cartoony antics that simply moving thier arms would produce a "wooooosh" noise.  Unless you've got clever writing the level of say, Scrubs, you're just not going to pull that off well.

[Gandalf Lundgren]

Blazing Saddles
The Big Lebowski
Three Amigos!
National Lampoon's Vacation
Life Of Brian
Ruthless People