Almost every Coen film can be labeled as a comedy, to be honest. Personally, I veered more into more straightforward comedies for my list, and actually had another Coen quite high on my list.
When people came in saying they weren't casting a ballot because they didn't like comedies anymore, I kind of wanted to reply, "well, maybe just submit a ranking of the Coen brother's movies, excluding No Country for Old Men, probably Blood Simple, and also probably Inside Llewyn Davis; and you'd be halfway there." But I didn't want to hint what may or maybe not be on my ballot (I was going to say Coen brothers, plus one other person, who shall currently go unnamed).
I said when casting my ballot, while I was going to be ranking them on how I think of them as comedies, I wasn't going to be voting many straight comedies (which I meant, as in, movies that you think of as vacuous, pure joke and laugh machines. though some of those are on my list).
Which ironically means that Coen-ranking line I suppressed wouldn't be accurate for describing my ballot.
I think one thing that causes the movies I chose to stick out to me, is that the comedies are interacting with something. It often gives them more bite or makes them stick to the bone more. Whatever sense I get from the jokes get amplified by the other emotions they're interacting with in the material.
Also because punchlines
often become less funny to me after enough repetitions. Not jokes that rely on the rake effect though. Those only get better.
I think one other thing that also applies, and this happens in spades with Fargo, since there's also the non-comedic plot going on, I'm less dependent upon the jokes to enjoy the movie. Which sounds counter-intuitive for why this might be relevant for how I said I was making my ballot. But, let's say I'm in a non-laughing mood but I kind of want to get myself into a better mood, that non-laughing mood might kill my ability to laugh at the jokes or quips in a straight comedy. Then I'm not enjoying myself at all, and I get into a non-laughing death spiral, because I'm feeling nothing. I watch a blend of genres, and even if I'm not initially laughing, my mind gets to relax and start to enjoy the other genre, and then my brain might kind of hit that spot where it can laugh again, while a comedic scene is happening, and then I can start shifting back into that comedic mindset. I think also in this case, because the style of the comedy of Fargo isn't dependent upon quips or gags, but rather the drawn-out (dark) absurdism of a situation, I think the movie puts less pressure on itself in making you want to laugh, which in some situations really works. Also, it's just really damn funny. Or maybe this is all rationalizing, and I'm just a cheap comedy-whore who thinks the accents are funny sounding, ya know.
For the record, the above "not in a laughing mood" situation above may have happened as I was reviewing some films before casting my ballot. One, "is this actually funny as I remember," got pretty far up on my ballot, and two others got kicked off of my ballot possibly just because I just wasn't in a laughing mood when I rewatched them. One of them I strongly suspect is ending up on this list. I'll save it for if it is, so I can get people's spit-takes when I go, "I re-watched it and I just did not laugh." I did take it as my cue to stop rewatching movies for this though.