Stir Crazy (1980)

Heading west to find a fresh start is a fine plan, as long as you don't end up in a cell along the way. Sidney Poitier's "Stir Crazy" teams two of the era's wildest comic talents, Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor, in one of the funniest films of its day. Skip (Wilder), a struggling playwright, and Harry (Pryor), an out-of-work actor, both lose their jobs in New York and set off for California in search of fame and fortune. When they run out of money in Arizona, they take a gig dressed as singing, dancing woodpeckers to promote a bank. But when two crooks steal their costumes and rob the bank, Skip and Harry are blamed and sentenced to 125 years in the state prison. There, they must survive a sadistic warden, a hulking mass murderer (Erland van Lidth) who turns out to have the voice of an opera singer and a prison rodeo, where the unlikely Skip becomes a star bull rider. JoBeth Williams co-stars as the cousin of their bumbling lawyer. Desperate to get out, the pair hatch an escape plan with a few fellow inmates that hinges on the big rodeo. Among the film's most famous moments is the scene in which Skip and Harry, terrified on their first day inside, strut into the cell block insisting, "That's right, we bad!" The second of four films Wilder and Pryor made together, following "Silver Streak," it showcases their perfect chemistry, with Wilder's nervous innocence playing off Pryor's quick-witted panic. It was a huge box-office hit, becoming one of the highest-grossing films of the year and the most successful film ever directed by a Black filmmaker at the time.