The creator of The Thick of It and In the Loop reveals the movie moments that helped to build his own sense of humour – and still make him laugh

Some jokes never lose their appeal – they just get better with time. One of Britain’s leading comic talents is to reveal the debt that he owes to film history by naming the comic moments that have shaped his own sense of humour.

Armando Iannucci, the creator of The Thick of It and In the Loop, will name what he regards as the funniest moments in cinema when he speaks later this month at the annual Screenwriters’ Festival in Cheltenham. Top of his list are sequences from The Graduate, Woody Allen’s Play It Again, Sam and Ken Loach’s 1991 Riff Raff, which is set on a British building site.

“They are just scenes that made me laugh but, more than that, they are the ones that still stand out in the memory,” said Iannucci, who is currently editing the later episodes of a new series of the award-winning comedy The Thick of It, which begins its run on BBC2 on Saturday.

“Lots of things make me laugh, of course, but these are the bits I always want to see again, whether they are silly or clever,” he explained. “They are each very striking in different ways.”

Iannucci has also chosen the risqué banter between Barbara Stanwyck and Henry Fonda in 1941 screwball comedy The Lady Eve. Directed by Preston Sturges, who also wrote the screenplay, it is one of those offerings from Hollywood’s heyday that seems remarkably modern for its day:

Stanwyck: I hope you didn’t mind my asking you to breakfast.

Fonda: It wouldn’t be polite if I said I did, would it?

Stanwyck: No, I don’t suppose it would.

Fonda: And it wouldn’t be true either. You have the darnedest way of bumping a fellow down and bouncing him up again.

Stanwyck: And then bumping him down again.

Fonda: Oh. I could imagine life with you being a series of ups and downs, some irritation, but very much happiness.

Stanwyck: Why, Hopsie! Are you proposing to me so soon?

Fonda: No, of course not. I’m just…

Stanwyck: Then you ought to be more careful. People have been sued for much less.

Fonda: Not by girls like you.

The comic writer has also selected a scene from the closing frames of Buster Keaton’s 1928 classic, Steamboat Bill, Jr. It features a storm that wakes up a sleeping Keaton and then blows away a hospital. Iannucci is an admirer of Keaton’s perfectionism. “Scenes like this are just so cleverly done and worked out that they still don’t feel old at all,” he said.

“I don’t really have an overall theory about film comedy, or why these scenes appeal to me so much, but they have all been quite influential,” .

Iannucci has picked the scene from Loach’s Riff Raff that shows a family walking together through parkland after a funeral. “It is all shot in one take,” he recalled. “And they just start fighting over the ashes. It is very well done.”

The scene chosen from Mike Nichols’s 1967 film The Graduate shows the young hero Benjamin Braddock, played by Dustin Hoffman, being led into an adulterous liaison with Mrs Robinson, played by Anne Bancroft, in a hotel suite. “There is a lot of silly stuff about whether or not he has a toothbrush with him,” said Iannucci, “but the thing I really love about The Graduate is the fact that you just think of it as a film, rather than as a comedy, and then when you see it again you realise how very funny many of the scenes are.”

Honourable mentions will also go to films such as 1980 spoof disaster movie Airplane!; to This Is Spinal Tap, the fake rockumentary from 1984; and to romantic comedy What’s Up, Doc? from 1972, which stars Ryan O’Neal and Barbra Streisand. “I am a big fan of Bill Forsyth films such as Gregory’s Girl and Local Hero, so I will try to work in a mention for one of those in my list, too.”

Some of his plaudits are destined for Play It Again, Sam, Allen’s powerful early comedy. “I have chosen the scene where Woody takes a girl back to his place and is very, very nervous while putting on some jazz and then accidentally trashes the place. It is an amazing visual performance and yet it is all quite natural, somehow,” he said.

While there is little slapstick in the new series of The Thick of It, which features the arrival of actress Rebecca Front as the thrusting new minister of the department, there is the tight plotting necessary for screen farce to work well. “We do have a bit of running in the new series, but not much physical humour, although there is a touch of hotel-style farce in one later episode,” revealed Iannucci.

Screen comedy and its role in society will be one of the major themes at the Screenwriters’ Festival this year, with a debate on the future of political satire. Paul Bassett-Davies (Spitting Image) and actress Francesca Martinez will also chair a panel charged with deciding where the boundaries of good comedy may lie.

The Screenwriters’ Festival will run from 26 to 29 October at the Cheltenham Ladies’ College. For details, go to www.screenwritersfestival.com

This charming and defiantly old-school animation of the Roald Dahl children’s classic gets the London film festival off to a cracking start

Wes Anderson gets his eccentric groove back on with a witty and likeable movie for little kids and their hip older siblings. It’s a demi-Americanised, wholly Andersonised version of the 1970 Roald Dahl children’s tale Fantastic Mr Fox, all about an elegant furry rapscallion pulling off the chicken-chomping crime of the century against three apoplectic farmers.

In a world where kids’ movies are generally presented in hi-tech 3D digital wonderment, Anderson defiantly presents his one in old-school stop-motion animation, making it look like something by Oliver Postgate or Jan Svankmajer. He even gets the fronds on his foxy heroes and heroines’ faces to stir and bristle in a style which for traditional animators was accidental – with the models being repositioned for each frame – but which for Anderson is a deliberate mannerism.

With co-writer Noah Baumbach, Anderson has created a movie with that oddball quality that I associate with both him and Michael Gondry: a quirky-homespun aesthetic with a meticulous foregrounding of knowing detail. He takes the story of the Fox clan and their battle against three agribusiness villains – Boggis, Bunce and Bean – and reimagines this feisty family as exactly the sort of amiably dysfunctional yet pin-smart bunch that he depicted in The Royal Tenenbaums and The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou.

Patriotic British filmgoers may, however, be disconcerted to note that with Mr Fox being voiced by George Clooney, Mrs Fox by Meryl Streep and their moody teen boy by Jason Schwartzman, the good guys are American. The baddies, led by a trigger-happy meanie voiced by Michael Gambon, are Brits. The local village appears to be from Olde Englande, with a pub and red post boxes, and the sound made by the local cider press is exactly like the textile lab in the Ealing classic The Man in the White Suit. Yet the Fox family attend an all-American high school over the hill, with a sports coach voiced by another Anderson repertory regular: Owen Wilson.

But even this cultural disconnect is all part of the general zaniness – which I confess I had found annoying in Anderson’s last film, The Darjeeling Limited, but which here is nicely judged. Something about pitching a film at children has put the charm and innocence back into Anderson’s comic style.

George Clooney’s smooth Mr Fox is in theory a mild-mannered newspaper columnist. But by night he is a daring robber and – without telling his wife – he plans to rob these three farmers of their livestock just as stylishly as Clooney’s Danny Ocean famously knocked over three Vegas casinos.

First, though, he needs help, starting with the dopey possum who fixes the sink in his new tree home. Then he employs the teenage cousin Kristofferson, who has come to stay in the family home and study at the local school – to his son’s chagrin, Kristofferson turns out to be a natural athlete and martial artist who furthermore winds up going steady with the class babe.

The farmers begin a military-style fightback against the vulpine invaders and Mr Fox and his crew have to dig for victory – and survival.

The key themes of Wes Anderson and his co-writer Noah Baumbach have generally been impossible, absurd families, each with a paterfamilias who’s stranger than fiction – and that’s how they have reimagined Mr Fox. It’s a smart and well-written kink in the furry Dahl tale.

• Peter Bradshaw is the Guardian’s film critic

• This article was amended on 16 October 2009. The original referred to the foxes as lupine invaders. This has been corrected.

Reel review: Shane Meadows’s latest – a mockumentary made in five days following Paddy Considine’s deluded roadie – could teach Hollywood a thing or two about economy, says Xan Brooks

Bloated and blank, Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn have come a long way down since Swingers and Made, writes Peter Bradshaw

A loo book written by Pol Pot would have more laughs than this chillingly unfunny, cynically prefabricated non-comedy, a product-placement-fest starring its co-writers, Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn. Like their film, they look bloated and blank – it’s as if some Botox-steroid-mix has been injected into their faces, and indeed the celluloid itself. These two comedy hombres have come a long way down since Swingers and Made, and Vaughn especially has none of the entertaining back-talk that made his name. Jason Bateman and Kristen Bell play an unhappy, childless husband and wife, convinced that a well-publicised “couples retreat” at an island holiday spa is the only answer to their woes. As they can only afford to go at the group rate, they persuade three other couples to go with them – including Favreau and Vaughn with spouses Kristin Davis and Malin Akerman. The experience opens up a nightmare in everyone else’s previously happy relationship. It’s not a bad high concept, but utterly devoid of life, humour or recognisable human beings. (Justice now compels me to record the one goodish joke; John Michael Higgins plays an annoying relationship therapist incessantly scribbling notes; when Vaughn objects, he asks: “Would you like me to stop writing?” “Thank you,” says Vaughn, mollified. “That’s interesting,” Higgins replies thoughtfully, and continues to take notes.) Everyone gives a poor performance but first among unfunny equals is Jean Reno in the fiercely unfunny role of Marcel, the visionary French founder of the spa.

As if we’ve not had enough movies about cynical adults being turned into mythical creatures to rediscover their inner child – now it’s the turn of the dental assistants of the fantasy world

Remember that film you saw that time when you were hungover and there was nothing else on? You know the one: it was about a hard-bitten professional losing sight of the magic of Christmas or something. And then something weird and supernatural happened to them and they physically turned into the thing they’d been so cynical about and remembered how important magic and childhood was after all? And then you saw that film again, on a plane, only starring someone different? And then your niece asked for something remarkably like it for her birthday?

Well, it turns out they’ve made it again. Same film. This time it’s starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

And it’s about the tooth fairy. Because apparently we’ve run out of good mythical figures, and are now reduced to exposing our children to the magical adventures of the dental assistants of the fantasy world.

Still. It must be a good film, right? Otherwise they wouldn’t have made it quite so many times.

The new twist on it this time is that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson – unimpressively called Derek “The Tooth Fairy” Thompson here, which isn’t much of an improvement – is an ice-hockey player.

A particularly mean one, with a talent for hitting people so hard their teeth are sent flying.

Derek is under threat from younger, feistier hockey players – although below he appears to be perhaps more of an erotic inspiration to one of the younger fellas in the background, and we should probably just draw a curtain across that. Or a towel, perhaps.

Under pressure at work and apparently not a very good example to the kids, he breaks a cardinal rule and almost tells a beautiful little girl that there’s no such thing as the tooth fairy.

And that, apparently, is what leads him to receive a punishment from the high fairy council (tooth department) – a week as a tooth fairy.

“With hilarious consequences!” That’s what comes next, right? That’s what always comes next, whether it’s true or not.

He learns to fly, which involves a pinch of dubious physics and a bucketload of being hit in the gonads with tennis balls, setting the tone for the rest of the jokes.

And, as he goes through fairy training and gadget preparation work, Dwayne-Derek “The Tooth Rock Fairy” Johnson-Thompson is seen to be co-starring with:

a) Julie Andrews, reprising her traditional role as some kind of bizarrely ageless fairy godmother.
b) Billy Crystal, who appears to be playing pretty much the same mad old magic man as in The Princess Bride.
c) Stephen Merchant, who appears to be playing “officious and tall” as perfectly as ever.
d) A giant pussycat. Who hasn’t, to my knowledge, been typecast (apart from as a cat), but does provide a handy nickname for Dwayne Johnson if he ever fancies going back to wrestling after all these sodding children’s films.

And then he’s set loose to visit children in their nightly repose and exchange monies for body parts. I have always said that tooth fairy thing was weird. Regardless, this is what happens.

Anyway, this reluctant tooth fairy begins his new job unhappily but, as time progresses, decides he can be the best tooth fairy in the world – announcing, ice-hockey-suited up and all cricky of neck at 1min 30sec: “But I’m doing it … MY WAY.” With … all together now … hilarious consequences.

Sigh.

And that’s all there is to it. At some point in there, you can be sure, he rediscovers the magic of childhood and reconnects with both his own inner child and his family. And maybe that guy in the locker room, too. Who knows?

That’s the marketing slogan you just know they thought up way before any of the rest of the film went into production.

And you know what, they might be right. I’m not sure that many people can, but those studio execs almost certainly won’t care. Why? Because the target market, the ones who may demand to watch it over and over again, probably while tugging on the end of your arm and in an increasingly whiny voice? They can handle it. And the rest of the world? Well, that’s what Boxing Day and aeroplanes and the phrase “I’m sure I’ve seen this film before” were invented for.

As if we’ve not had enough movies about cynical adults being turned into mythical creatures to rediscover their inner child – now it’s the turn of the dental assistants of the fantasy world

Remember that film you saw that time when you were hungover and there was nothing else on? You know the one: it was about a hard-bitten professional losing sight of the magic of Christmas or something. And then something weird and supernatural happened to them and they physically turned into the thing they’d been so cynical about and remembered how important magic and childhood was after all? And then you saw that film again, on a plane, only starring someone different? And then your niece asked for something remarkably like it for her birthday?

Well, it turns out they’ve made it again. Same film. This time it’s starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

And it’s about the tooth fairy. Because apparently we’ve run out of good mythical figures, and are now reduced to exposing our children to the magical adventures of the dental assistants of the fantasy world.

Still. It must be a good film, right? Otherwise they wouldn’t have made it quite so many times.

The new twist on it this time is that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson – unimpressively called Derek “The Tooth Fairy” Thompson here, which isn’t much of an improvement – is an ice-hockey player.

A particularly mean one, with a talent for hitting people so hard their teeth are sent flying.

Derek is under threat from younger, feistier hockey players – although below he appears to be perhaps more of an erotic inspiration to one of the younger fellas in the background, and we should probably just draw a curtain across that. Or a towel, perhaps.

Under pressure at work and apparently not a very good example to the kids, he breaks a cardinal rule and almost tells a beautiful little girl that there’s no such thing as the tooth fairy.

And that, apparently, is what leads him to receive a punishment from the high fairy council (tooth department) – a week as a tooth fairy.

“With hilarious consequences!” That’s what comes next, right? That’s what always comes next, whether it’s true or not.

He learns to fly, which involves a pinch of dubious physics and a bucketload of being hit in the gonads with tennis balls, setting the tone for the rest of the jokes.

And, as he goes through fairy training and gadget preparation work, Dwayne-Derek “The Tooth Rock Fairy” Johnson-Thompson is seen to be co-starring with:

a) Julie Andrews, reprising her traditional role as some kind of bizarrely ageless fairy godmother.
b) Billy Crystal, who appears to be playing pretty much the same mad old magic man as in The Princess Bride.
c) Stephen Merchant, who appears to be playing “officious and tall” as perfectly as ever.
d) A giant pussycat. Who hasn’t, to my knowledge, been typecast (apart from as a cat), but does provide a handy nickname for Dwayne Johnson if he ever fancies going back to wrestling after all these sodding children’s films.

And then he’s set loose to visit children in their nightly repose and exchange monies for body parts. I have always said that tooth fairy thing was weird. Regardless, this is what happens.

Anyway, this reluctant tooth fairy begins his new job unhappily but, as time progresses, decides he can be the best tooth fairy in the world – announcing, ice-hockey-suited up and all cricky of neck at 1min 30sec: “But I’m doing it … MY WAY.” With … all together now … hilarious consequences.

Sigh.

And that’s all there is to it. At some point in there, you can be sure, he rediscovers the magic of childhood and reconnects with both his own inner child and his family. And maybe that guy in the locker room, too. Who knows?

That’s the marketing slogan you just know they thought up way before any of the rest of the film went into production.

And you know what, they might be right. I’m not sure that many people can, but those studio execs almost certainly won’t care. Why? Because the target market, the ones who may demand to watch it over and over again, probably while tugging on the end of your arm and in an increasingly whiny voice? They can handle it. And the rest of the world? Well, that’s what Boxing Day and aeroplanes and the phrase “I’m sure I’ve seen this film before” were invented for.

Zombie movies have been around for some time now, the greatest being the Val Lewton-Jacques Tourneur horror classic I Walked With a Zombie (1943), a reworking of Jane Eyre on a Caribbean island. Nowadays, the flesh-eating monsters are more often an occasion for black humour than blood-curdling horror, as in the surprise international success of our own Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead, and this almost endearing picture. Following a zombie holocaust caused by a deadly virus linked to mad cow disease, there appear to be only four humans left in the States. They’re the diffident undergraduate Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), the chocolate-craving, gun-toting redneck Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson in a characteristic role), and two female confidence tricksters, the 12-year-old Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) and her older sister, Wichita (Emma Stone), so named for their respective destinations.

However, on joining forces, they decide to head west, cracking jokes and severing heads en route, and in Los Angeles they discover there’s a fifth survivor. He’s the great deadpan artist Bill Murray playing himself and he’s got by through simulating zombie status. Murray is hilarious and the chief reason for seeing the film.

Shot on a shoestring over five days and largely improvised, this is a low-life, north-of-England, cod rockumentary, kitchen sink meets Spinal Tap as it were, reuniting once more director Meadows and his favourite actor, Paddy Considine. Meadows as himself purports to be making a documentary about Le Donk (Considine), a failed rocker trying to promote the career of the real-life Nottingham MC and rapper who styles himself Scor-zay-zee (pronounced Scorsese). The object is to get him into the supporting programme of an Arctic Monkeys gig at the Old Trafford stadium in Manchester. Considine is outrageously funny and never steps out of character, but the film hardly adds up to an evening’s entertainment.

Ramin Bahrani is a director who is finding a style of American cinema that is different from both Hollywood commerce and indie-Sundance drear: his new movie is an instantly gripping, funny, quietly persuasive drama that held me from the first frames.

Souleymane Sy Savane gives a superbly likeable performance as Solo, a Senegalese taxi driver in North Carolina. One day, he picks up a morose old white guy called William, played by Red West, who offers Solo $1,000 to take him to a remote and dangerous beauty spot on a certain date. The exuberant and compassionate Solo suspects that William wishes to make away with himself, and so tries to involve himself in his life, even insisting that William coach him for his upcoming Airline Flight Attendant exam.

Perhaps inspired by Kiarostami’s 1997 classic Taste Of Cherry, the movie is nonetheless entirely distinctive: about friendship and perhaps also about the impossibility of ever really knowing another person.

Shane Meadows shows us his lighter side with a low-budget, improvised mockumentary comedy about a delusional roadie and would-be manager called Le Donk, played by Paddy Considine, scheming to get his rapper protege Scor-zay-zee a support slot for the Arctic Monkeys gig he’s working on.

It has to be said that Le Donk is heavily indebted to Steve Coogan’s character creations – Tommy Saxondale with Alan Partridge’s attitude – but also that the film is often funny. Le Donk is living apart from his heavily pregnant girlfriend, played by Olivia Coleman, and must come to terms with the fact that she has a new, much younger lover who is to be her birthing partner. All his emotional life is now invested in his act: Scor-zay-zee, otherwise Dean Palinczuk, a real-life rapper who plays a version of himself.

At just 71 minutes, the film is slight, but there’s enough there for Meadows to create a plausible narrative arc with solid laughs along the way and a very surreal moment when Scor-zay-zee reveals that he has converted to Islam and recites the first chapter of the Koran.