The best comedy movies of 2026 (so far)

What if, days before getting married, your spouse-to-be revealed their darkest secret? Would you let their worst moment reshape how you see them? Some have accused Kristoffer Borgli’s dark romcom of being little more than a dinner-party prompt, but that ignores Robert Pattinson’s hilarious performance as a snooty Brit in full crash-out after learning of his American fiancée’s (Zendaya) major teenage indiscretion. Granted, Borgli introduces some third-rail topics he doesn’t show much interest in actually touching, but the scenario allows this stellar duo to generate some of the cringiest comedy of the year.

An anticapitalist satire that doesn’t mince its words, Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice argues that the rat race makes criminals of us all, even those who aren’t cut out for it. Squid Game’s Lee Byung-hun is a middle-manager at a paper company who loses the job that’s come to define him and determines to find employment by any means necessary – murder included. Chan-wook’s camerawork achieves new levels of sinuous virtuosity, but Byung-hun is the comedic MVP, going from complacent suburban dad to bungling amateur assassin who redefines ‘failing upward’.

Fresher and funnier than a film about the collapse of media has any right to be, the return of 2006’s most trendsetting comedy hits all the fan-pleasing beats and throws in some new ones for good measure: Nigel in the – gasp – staff canteen; Miranda still having no clue who Andy is; Emily’s every utterance. There’s also the opportunity to laugh at conceited tech bro types in the shape of Justin Theroux’s buffoonish, Jeff Bezos-alike tycoon who woos Emily (Emily Blunt) as his trophy bride. Inevitably, though, it’s Meryl Streep who delivers the biggest chuckles with a new barrage of withering Miranda put-downs.

Ah, the early 2010s: a time of Craigslist roommates, OkCupid dates and Pavement wannabes as far as the eyes could see. Calling writer-director Chandler Levack’s romcom ‘the indie-rock Almost Famous’ might be overstating it, but ‘a millennial Reality Bites’ hits the mark, as Barbie Ferreira’s aspiring music critic relocates to the hipster hotbed of Montreal in summer 2011 and falls into a love triangle with two members of the same band. Even if you don’t know Joanna Newsom from Joanna Gruesome, you’ll recognise the twentysomething urge to make terrible decisions – although hopefully you avoided having sex in a bedbug-infested apartment. A delightful, heartfelt surprise.

Who knew divorce could be funny? Of course, it helps with it’s Will Arnett and Laura Dern doing it. Bradley Cooper’s latest film oscillates smartly between comedy and drama in a way that’s way too real to allow for the tag ‘dramedy’. There’s funny people everywhere you look here, with UK stand-up John Bishop providing the real-life inspiration for the story of Arnett’s divorcé, Alex, stumbling on open-mic nights as a way to process his pain, and Cooper stealing scenes as the actor friend who takes his success hard. The stand-up gigs provide zingers but there’s plenty of wrily observational laughs, too, and two hilariously blunt parents in Christine Ebersole and Ciarán Hinds to deliver unhelpful home truths.​ A bittersweet gem.

A decent calculus for describing cult Canadian web series Nirvanna the Band the Show is ‘if Nathan Fielder made Flight of the Conchords’. In this big-screen jaunt for creator-stars Matt Johnson and Jay McCarroll’s struggling musical duo, scripted bits blend with hidden-camera stunts so seamlessly it’s nearly impossible to tell what’s what. Transitioning from a guerrilla skydive off Toronto’s CN Tower into a full-on Back to the Future spoof, it’s low-budget but high ambition. Don’t worry if you haven’t seen the show – you’ll be too busy pondering how the hell they pulled it all off to concern yourself with backstory.

A college dorm becomes the setting for an epic quest in a stoner comedy that will make 21 Jump Street fans laugh til they barf. Butterfly-loving softboi Montgomery (Sean Giambrone) and his reckless roommate Jack (Stranger Things’ Gaten Matarazzo) must get downstairs to collect a pizza before the industrial-grade hallucinogens they’ve rashly swallowed turn their brains into a scene from Jacob’s Ladder. Spoiler: they will not succeed. It’s very silly indeed, homaging every stoner staple in the handbook, but commits to the bit with such charm that you can only succumb to the contact high. Lysander the grandiloquent butterfly and deranged delivery robot Snackatron 3000 tie for best supporting lunacy.

Olivia Wilde, how did we ever doubt you? The actor-director hit a bump with her viral-for-the-wrong-reasons sci-fi Don’t Worry Darling but she bounces back with a riotous sex comedy that lets it all hang out in the most precisely orchestrated way imaginable. A San Francisco couple (Wilde, Seth Rogen) invite their horny upstairs neighbours (Penélope Cruz, Edward Norton) down for an impromptu soirée in their newly renovated apartment and one thing leads to another... which leads to something excruciating funny and unexpectedly truthful. The foursome deliver an orgy of one-liners, blunt put-downs and stoner chuckles in the comedy that even invites comparisons with peak Mike Nichols.