Comedy as a genre is about manners and morality. The direction of American comedy that you reference is what I refer to as “blockbuster comedy” and the story is typically about someone who is a loser/idiot/buffoon/jerk who has a singular (usually small) moral conviction and gets transformed into a hero who would die for their conviction and the character that it’s transformed them into and typically they have one last great idiot-scheme that highlights the heroism of their idiocy while elevating their conviction.

My favorite movies that highlight this arc are Tommy Boy, Happy Gilmore and Legally Blonde…I’ve written extensively (unpublished) on the genius of Legally Blonde - how Elle doesn’t need a makeover like in so many pettier female led comedies (Miss Congeniality, Princess Diaries) but instead goes through a moral transformation (like Cher in Clueless). A moral makeover, an idea I really love these days.

Anora is one of these comedies that cares more about style and petty laughter than realizing the goal of subconsciously inspiring or motivating the audience into embracing themselves the way they are (idiot/jerk and all), so long as they follow what they care about.

I get her not liking Anora (which I'd gave called a drama, personally, and certainly not a "screwball," though I wish she'd noted who'd used that term), but last year gave us Deadpool and Wolverine as well as The Fall Guy, and while that's only two (I'm just not up to date on movies like I used to be), they both had me laughing so hard (and especially in the case of DaW, at some incredibly filthy stuff) I was in pain at certain points. This feels like the "X is dying" pop culture column subgenre, which almost always is cyclical.

Gotta get back to working, but just read the first third of this... Initial thoughts are basically, "oh yeah, I never thought about it, but that's why I only want to watch YouTube shorts for feel good media-based entertainment anymore..."

@dagny761, check this out.

welp, with the combo of people being easily offended and young people having zero attention span, i think yes, this could be the end of funny movies

Anora was certainly NOT a comedy. I felt betrayed by the label.

I've been noticing a lot of horror movies getting labelled as thrillers and vice versa too.

I'd hardly say we had "race" figured out, but there is no doubt humor has been sucked out of the system in favor of hurt feelings.