Film Review: Monty Python And The Holy Grail (1975) B+

Date watched: 12/31/05
Venue: DVD
Grade: B+

Warning: This review contains dreaded spoilers...

I’ve never been a big fan of British comedy. It’s generally either too ‘out there’ for me or simply relies on a lot of build up for very little pay off. Yes, I know British ‘humour’ is all about the drolly-told setup, but you know, it just doesn’t do it for me on a regular basis. That said, I recently watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail for the first time (about 30 years too late, yeah, I know), and you know what, I actually quite enjoyed it.

The story revolves around King Arthur’s (Graham Chapman) silly adventures while attempting to gather up knights to join him in his quest to find the Holy Grail. Along the way he encounters a rather motley crew of cowardly knights, uppity peasants, crude Frenchmen, and other assorted oddities.

The film is, at it’s heart, a parody of epic-y medieval films, yet it plays like a series of vignettes, there’s not much in terms of story arc or character development, just a bunch of Arthur and his knight’s ridiculous episodes.

Interestingly, there’s a lot action that’s left to play in wider angles. I’ve always been a fan of 1970s frame compositions, and it’s funny to think that even the parody films of the seventies liked to keep it wide.

The film works best whenever there’s some kind of tightly paced banter (the entire witch scene, the peasants ruminations on the nature of their society, any discussion of swallows, African or otherwise), usually among the film’s supporting cast, whilst poor King Arthur plays the poor straight man to all the nonsense. You have to love Lancelot (John Cleese), blindly maiming dozens of innocents to save supposed damsel in distress, as well as Sir Robin’s minstrels, who constantly accompany him with songs relegating his less than courageous exploits.

Some of the‘out of left field’ bits were a bit much (the animated sections, for starters), and to be honest, the film’s ending (wherein modern day policemen apprehend our knights of the round table after they murder a modern day historian (don’t ask, it doesn’t make any sense), feels like they Pythons simply ran out of ideas, or more likely, money.

But for the most part, Monty Python and the Holy Grail really works and I recommend it to any film fan. Even if you hate British comedy and loath over-the-top farce, you should still see it, considering half the film’s dialog is part of our cultural vocabulary (who hasn’t said “tis only a flesh wound’ while losing limbs in a video game, and I know I’ve certainly yelled ‘Run away! Run away!’ to a USC quarterback or two fleeing blitzing defenders).

Score: 8/10

Additional notes:

I got the special edition of this for Christmas, and while I haven’t watched any of extra features, the descriptions of them on the back of the box are downright hysterical. Read them and you’ll see. Maybe British humor works better in print, I dunno.

Speaking of British humor, they’ve tacked on a new beginning to the movie. Well, kinda. It’s a minute or two of black & white opening credits for another, fictions film, interrupted by the sounds of a projectionist, realizing his mistake, and switching reels to our desired film. Yeah, kinda lame. Two minutes to tell a joke that’s not that funny. And one you see coming ten miles away, without binoculars.

And I wasn’t joking when I say this film is an essential part of our vocabulary. I’d never seen more than ten minutes at once on television and I knew virtually every line of dialog for the first 45 minutes or so.