Crime should be no laughing matter. Movies like The Godfather, Scarface, and L.A. Confidential revel in crime's capacity for destruction and moral corruption. But spend any time reading news of the weird and you'll see that, with the correct perspective and distance, illegal activities can be hilarious—desperate people doing desperate things, and with awful results. Thus, the crime-comedy.
This Friday, a new film joins the genre. Stand Up Guys, starring, Al Pacino, Christopher Walken, and Alan Arkin, revolves around betrayals and hired killers, but with the light touch directors like the Coens and Tarantino have perfected. Stand Up Guys might not prove to be one of the genre's enduring works, but it does offer the perfect opportunity to talk about the 25 Best Crime-Comedies.
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