The Most Holy Grail Part 4 - The Climax!

"So, brave knights, if you do doubt your courage or your strength, come no further, for Death awaits you all, with nasty, big, pointy teeth." -- Cleese, as Tim the Enchanter

John Cleese, in his memoir "So, Anyway...", relates a story told him by a friend, a story that Cleese finds hilarious, involving the accidental and unintentional torture of a wounded bunny. (It's on pg. 103 of the paperback edition, and I agree with Cleese-- it's hilarious.) This-- is the rabbit's revenge!

Just a housekeeping reminder, this blog is an examination and celebration of the comedy of Monty Python's Flying Circus, the BBC television show. Having done all the episodes and most of the albums (see below,) we're now taking a look at THE movie, the one that everyone (in the States) knows and loves, and seeing how the group's sketch comedy roots impact on the material, for good and for ill. Sketch comedy clearly inspires most of what Monty Python creates, but when making a movie with sincere cinematic ambition, sketch comedy chops can limit you, lead you down the road to an episodic structure that fails to build adequately. This possibility becomes more probable when the lads are writing by committee (as Python tended to write,) and there's no lead writer or unifying vision with veto/editorial power. Can the creators overcome their own instincts and build comedic narrative tension into a climax?

The results seem mixed. The film begins with a series of inspired comedy bits, but none of them seem to carry forward. The "plot" beats-- the gathering of the team, the divine gift of the Quest, and the knights and their individual attempts to find the Grail-- all of them bring us back to the end of the second act. with no consequences or results. The team is still together, still looking, just as they were at the end of Act 1, and it's tempting to think that we're just spinning our wheels.

But consider a few things. One of them-- these guys are much smarter than we are. They were as aware of their sketch comedy limits as any pompous blogger, and chose a classic narrative that accommodated, even enabled, their instincts. The King Arthur story, like a lot of early British mythology, is episodic in nature. This structure allows them to insert their sketches, while letting the momentum of the narrative carry them forward, like jazz musicians riffing on "A Tisket, A Tasket" ad nauseum, only funnier (and shorter.) Another of them-- They have created a kind of build with the frequent use of callbacks, such as beating cats like rugs, the coconuts, and the return of characters to comment on the movie. It may not build tension all that much, but it does reward the audience for paying attention to the earlier scenes, and keep them engaged in future scenes, on the look for more of the callbacks (and there will be more!)

However! (Remember, I said the results were mixed?) There is some solid evidence that the lads are trying to meet the challenge of extended cinematic narrative. As we get more into the film, we start to see multi-scene sequences, some mediocre (The Knights of Ni-- sorry, I just don't find this bit funny.) and some inspired (The Quest of Sir Launcelot-- exquisite!) We also see, in these extended sequences, indications that the entire troupe is contributing bits to the overall sequence, creating a more unified vision. Finally, in the famous "Scene 24", we find a scene where there is no joke. Gilliam, as a cackling cataracted lunatic, tells Arthur and Bedevere to seek an Enchanter who will lead them to the Grail, whereupon he disappears. The only purpose of this scene is to create an expectation of getting closer to the Grail, the goal. This is narrative structure.

It pays off in the last scene we examined, wherein the reunited knights meet Tim, the Enchanter, who tells them (in between intimidating displays of pyrotechnics) that the Grail awaits in a cave, but before they reach the cave, they will face certain death. And it will pay off further as we continue.

And, hey, if you all don't already own this movie, buy it here! Be honest with your media needs-- you know you want to watch it over and over again.  (Plus, it's on Netflix right now, so what's your excuse?)

We begin with a very Bergman-esque shot-- skull profile, close in the foreground, and the knights in the background seem to trot out of its nose, led by Tim. The "horses" aka the guys banging the coconuts, get spooked, so the knights have to dismount. Great dedication and fealty to the coconut gag here. Tim guides them to a craggy ridge, beyond which lies a smokey clearing and a cave-- "The Cave of Caerbonnog!" Bones litter the clearing, and Arthur, terrified, is about to brave it, when a cheesy orchestral bang alerts us that it's too late. Out from the cave lurches-- the cutest little white bunny you ever saw!

The lads have built up tension before in this film, but usually the reveal is some large knight, with three heads or a flair for the monosyllabic. This time, they went the other way. Not content to play the gag, the boys now comment on it. Once it becomes clear that, when Tim spoke of Death with sharp pointy teeth, he was speaking of this cute bunny, the knights get pissed off. "You silly sod! You got us all worked up!" Tim protests that that's no ordinary rabbit, but "the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent y'ever laid eyes on!" And he is proven correct, when a redshirt knight goes to chop its head off, and the rabbit turns the tables, in a hysterical practical effect only Gilliam could have pulled off. The rabbit zip lines towards the anonymous knight's neck, just beneath the helmet. A quick cut to close up of the white bunny at the knight's neck, bulging with viscera and blood, and we're back to a long shot. The knight has been decapitated, and his corpse falls to the ground. "Jesus Christ!" screams Arthur, and Tim exults in his vindication-- "I warned you, didn't I?"

Thus begins one of the greatest and most memorable bits in the film, the Killer Rabbit bit. It's hard to guess who wrote it. It's silly enough for Palin to have created it, it's cruel enough for Chapman/Cleese (plus they have a thing for animals, those two,) and it's cinematic enough for Jones/Gilliam to have come up with it. More than any other piece in the movie, this one feels like a team effort from concept to execution. It's a truly wonderful bit, and if you haven't seen it, I envy you your first experience of it, and stop reading this tiresome piece and watch it!

The Knights charge the bunny, outnumbering  it 10-1, but it doesn't matter. The rabbit zips around from neck to neck, its white fur dripping with blood and gore. Idle's cowardly Sir Robin barely holds it at bay with his shield, Galahad can't get a bead on it, and finally Arthur sounds the retreat; "Run Away!" as Tim cackles at their comeuppance.

The Knights regroup, trying to figure out a way round this fluffy killing machine. We get the first beat of a new running gag as they try and count their dead-- three, but Arthur calls it five. "Three, sir," Galahad corrects him. "Three," Arthur agrees. Sir Robin suggests running away some more, ("Oh, shut up! And go and change your armor.") But bloodthirsty Launcelot suggests the Holy Hand Grenade!

In a new bit that feels like equal parts Idle and Palin, as well as performed by Idle and Palin, Brother Maynard (Idle) brings down a chest from the overlooking ridge, and inside is what looks like a thurible, or censer, a round ball with a cross on its peak. For instruction, Maynard orders his foppish minion, Palin, to consult the book of Armaments. (blissful sigh). Palin, in a high-pitched Knights of Ni voice, reads a funny biblical passage-- "Oh, Lord, blesseth thou this, thy Holy Hand Grenade, that with it, thou might blow thine enemies to bits, in thine mercy"--  that comes with instructions to pull the pin, count to three, and "lobbeth". Counting to three turns out to be an issue with Arthur's 3/5 dyslexia, but they manage to get the grenade thrown, and the rabbit blown to bits.

But there are consequences to explosive tactics, or blowback, as we call it here. The Detectives investigating the homicide of the Historian hear the grenade go off. They are on the case and making progress, having caught up to the abandoned shrubbery garden Arthur gave to the Knights of Ni. (I imagine the word "Ni" can't stand up to the Po-po, and they scampered.) Hearing the explosion, they run towards its source. The clock is ticking!

The Cave of Caerbonnig secured, the Knights make their way into the deep, dark, dank cave. Lots of production value and cinematic ambition here, thank you,Terries. Finally they get to a wall with an inscription carved into it. Brother Maynard is called in to read it, since the language is Arimathean. The inscription says that the Grail is in the Castle "Arrrrrgh". There is a lot of discussion about what this means-- did he die while writing it, was he dictating, is there a Castle Arrrrrrgh, etc.

But all of this is just misdirection; the real clue stands behind them, a many-eyed horned dragon. We've seen this beast before, in the animated seasonal montage from the last sequence, and this time he's come to dinner! He gobbles up Brother Maynard in short order, and chases after the rest of the knights as we morph into a Gilliamination. The chase goes backwards and forwards, but seems to spell doom for Arthur and the Knights, who have spent their Holy Hand Grenade on a cute bunny. As the dragon closes in, however, in a very self-aware cheat, Palin's voice over takes us to Gilliam at a drawing desk. Gilliam draws, grimaces, and falls backwards, dead as Palin recounts that the animator died, and the threat disappeared. The quest for the Grail could continue.

Not sure how I feel about his resolution-- it doesn't feel earned, but neither does the threat. And it's undeniably funny. It casts the creators as sadists just looking to make things difficult for our Hero, and in essence, that's what writers are. Just as the bunny gets its revenge at the start, so the fictional characters tormented by us often tend to survive us.

Meanwhile, back at the cave mouth, the murder investigation is picking up pace. The detectives, having found the source the of the noise that alerted them in the first place, sift through the carnage and bones. This tends to implicate the blameless knights, doesn't it? 

The Most Holy Grail Part 3 - Bad Guys?

 "You only killed the Bride's father-- that's all... You put a sword right through his head!"
"Oh, dear - is he all right?" -- Palin and Cleese as Aggrieved Father and Mortified Launcelot

We're about halfway into the first real Monty Python movie, and so far, we've seen the lads struggling a bit to rise to the occasion. After years of chomping at the bit to make movies, they have a movie to make, and the effort required to escape the gravity of their sketch comedy roots is proving to be daunting. They started strong, with silly credits and a series of stand-alone bits that are deservedly classics of the genre. But these were essentially sketches, often with very static blocking, despite the magnificent production design that surrounded them. As the film pushes on, we see a more serious effort to realize the promise of the medium. We get a musical number, albeit more a sketch than a story beat. We also find some attempts to create deeper narratives, requiring, say, movement, multiple scenes, and sustained tension. Some have worked (the French Soldiers, Galahad's Quest), and some have not (the Knights of Ni-- sorry.) When the content lags a bit, they create forward momentum and engagement with call backs to prior scenes, animation, and breaking the fourth wall, as well as a story thread that takes us out of the Medieval era and into present time-- the death of the Historian.

But the lads have some gas in the tank, some junk in the trunk, some blood in the grail, if you will. They are figuring this thing out, and in this section we'll see them come to realize that silly and structure are not mutually exclusive, but can, in fact, really work well together.

Arthur has rounded up his knights-- Bedevere, Galahad, Lancelot and Robin. He has been given the Quest by God, and after a disaster at a French castle, he has decided to split everyone up and let them search individually. We've had Robin's quest, Galahad's Quest, and Arthur actually has a clue as to how to get to the grail, but he has to get through the shrub-luvin' Knights of Ni first. Now... it's Lancelot's turn.

Ooops.

We begin with the first real stand-alone Gilliamination, as a scribener puts the finishing touches on a title page announcing the Quest of Sir Launcelot. But... a loud sound outside shakes his world, sending erratic scribbles all over the carefully crafted page. This is a common Gilliam theme, showing us how high art meets the mundane-- the most spectacular works of art you've ever seen were late drafts, and Gilliam shows us the early drafts, warts and all. The scribener, frustrated and perturbed, goes outside to see what the racket is. Gilliam's teasing comes to the fore, as the scribener goes down multiple flights of stairs,ultimately tripping and falling (off screen) to the tile floor below.

When he gets outside, the sun and the clouds are doing jumping exercises, ("Heyyyyy-YUP!") landing hard on the barren green globe. It's not just his world that's shaking-- it's THE world. He tells them to clear off, and they abashedly obey, the clouds running off right, and the sun shuffling back beyond the horizon, creating an exquisite sunset. This doesn't appease the scribener. "Bloody weather," he mutters in the dark of night.This is yet another stand alone bit, but it's nice to see Gilliam do his thing for the movie in more than just a supportive role. We return to the next draft of the title page, finished by the scribener without incident; The Tale of Sir Launcelot.

That's more like it!

I have no idea who wrote this particular bit, but I get the sense that Cleese came up with the basic conceit of a knight going in to rescue a damsel in distress, but getting his messages mixed, and instead of saving the day, winds up slaughtering an entire wedding. Doesn't that just sound like something Basil Fawlty would do? However, it soon becomes clear that once the conceit was designed, everyone piled on this sketch.

With most of the quests, we start with the knight in question; Robin's quest started with Robin and his minstrels, Galahad started with Galahad struggling through the storm... you get the idea. But Lancelot breaks that pattern, and to excellent effect.

It begins with Jones and Palin, the set up. Jones, the effeminate and extremely pale son of a land-coveting Lord, is about to be married off to Princess Lucky, who famously owns "huuuuge tracts of land". He feels melancholy about the whole arrangement,and is about to look out of the high tower window and sing-- but the pragmatic and unsentimental Father, who spends a lot of the scene shouting and pacing, won't have it."You're not going to do a song while I'm here!" With that, he calls the Guards to keep him a prisoner in the tower.

More typical damsel in distress

See what they did? The Father's back story, Herbert/Alice's urge to sing, the orchestral swells which get cut off, all of this feels like Jones and Palin doing their amateur theatrics. But the big twist on the old story, having it be a Dude in distress instead of a Damsel, that feels like Cleese. He was very hung up on fairy tale tropes at the time, having just finished working on one with Connie Booth, so he would've been in the neighborhood anyway. Plus, it is this twist which will contribute to the misunderstanding that will pay off such huge dividends later on.

Now we get what feels like an Idle scene, with Idle and Chapman as the hapless and clueless Guards charged with keeping Jones in the tower. Palin has a simple set of instructions for the Guards, but they just don't get it. Idle doesn't get it, anyway. Chapman just hiccups off to the side. (Is this casting because he had a drinking problem?) Here's an illustrative exchange...

"Just keep him in here."
"Until you, or anyone else..."
"No. Not anyone else. Just me."

It's maddening, sustained frustration, it goes on forever, and it's hilarious, as Idle plays every misunderstanding that could possibly occur-- and some that couldn't. But finally, the Father leaves, stopping yet another song before he goes,urging Chapman's hiccuping guard to drink some water.

But the instructions, as specific and maddening as they were, said nothing about stopping the Prince from asking for help, and the clever Prince tries to nonchalantly shoot a message attached to an arrow out of the high tower window. He fails, of course, his oh-so-casual shooting being not only not nonchalant, but hopelessly, tragically chalant. But the Guards don't care-- they're following the instructions to the letter, and no farther. Palin said nothing about stopping Herbert from sending out an arrow for help.

Now that the set up has been accomplished, we cut to Lancelot training his page to leap over brooks. His page, named Concorde (Dennis Moore, anyone?) is played by Idle-- man that guy gets around! Just as he's about to ford a stream, ThhhhhhWACK! An arrow sticks out of his chest. "Message for you, sir" he says as he collapses. A great bit of underplaying by Idle, counter-balanced by Cleese's over the top Lancelot. "Brave, brave Concorde-- you shall not have died in vain!" And in a call back to "Bring out your dead!", Idle stirs. "I'm not quite dead, sir...Really, I feel fine,sir."

But Lancelot is not to be distracted by details. The arrow contained a note, that is gender unspecific, and sounds, indeed like it might have been written by a woman. Eager this call to action, Cleese insists that Concorde just lie there while he accomplishes this task in his own "particular... idiom". And off he goes, leaving Concorde to ask "I'll just stay here then, shall I, sir?" (The script has a different line that I actually prefer; "It just seems silly, me lying here.")

Now we cut to the castle, as the porcine bride gets all trussed up, and the wedding guests mingle and murmur. At the castle entrance, two Guards (always two, aren't there?) stand, bored. One chomps an apple. But something catches their eye-- off in the distance, across a green field, a figure races for them. Ominous drums beat.

Back with the Guards, bemused silence. They take another look.

Across the field, the figure races for them, ominous drums pounding-- but he's no closer than last time! The Guards look again--and he's still about a hundred yards away, no closer for all of his running. Another look-- no closer! Then suddenly, he's upon them, killing one Guard before the other can even protest.

Here he comes...

This is a nice bit, probably Jones having fun in the editing bay. It's certainly not in the script. It's truly cinematic and silly at the same time, inspired in a way that "Stop that singing!" and Cleveland's violation of the fourth wall isn't. He manages to build the tension in a goofy way that isn't essentially a spoof on the way that other movies build tension. And it's slow, exquisitely slow, as a prelude to the rapid fire slaughter that now follows.

Cleese is now on the scene. With a demented,toothy smile, he swings, stabs, disarms, beheads and eviscerates the wedding party, fighting his way into the castle courtyard and pushing up the stairs. The lads don't sugarcoat it-- there's blood, painful groans, weeping and death rattles beneath Cleese's triumphant "Hah!"s and "Ho-ho!"s-- but that somehow makes it all the funnier.

We see stunts, blood,and dead bodies collapsing to the ground. None of his combatants are armed or equal to his ferocity. he takes out the dancers as the minstrels play. Then he takes out the minstrels. he chops and bludgeons his way into the bridal chamber, where Princess Lucky and her handmaidens giggle and fuss, but the party is over. Lancelot stabs, slices, hews, kicks the bride in the chest, and rushes up anlother flight of stairs, taking a moment to hack at a small vase of flowers on the wall.

Oooops.

Cleese finally makes it up the tower stairs, his sword caked with blood, and arrives in Prince Herbert's room, killing the befuddled Guards. (Chapman's last words-- "Hic".) He kneels quickly before Jones-- "Oh, fair one, behold your humble servant Sir Launcelot..." and then he gets a look at him. "I'm terribly sorry." Jones practically swoons; "You got my note!" "Well, I got a note..." Cleese replies, completely at a loss. Jones is so thrilled, he bursts into song--

But Palin cuts it off, screaming "Stop it!" to the off screen orchestra. And in a quick sketch insertion, a furious Palin calls the mortified Cleese on the tapestry for killing all of his wedding guests. Cleese can only apologize, "Well, I really didn't mean to." It's a classic and o-so-British bit, a school boy being yelled at by the headmaster, only for mass murder. Meanwhile, in the background, Prince Alice/Herbert has tied bed linens together to escape from the tall tower, and urges Lancelot to join in his escape.

That thing in the window is the Prince falling to his death.

But once Lancelot mentions Camelot, all is forgiven. "Camelot?... Very nice castle, Camelot. Very good pig country." They are fast friends now, and Palin offers Lancelot a drink downstairs. As they head off, with Cleese saying "That's awfully nice of you..." Palin quickly cuts the bed linen rope, sending Jones falling down the extremely tall tower... for reasons that will soon be apparent.

Of course, "downstairs" means back into the carnage. In the bridal chamber, moans and cries fill the air as keening mourners crouch over the dead and the bridesmaids see to the bride, spitting blood all over her gown. At the sight of Lancelot, things get... awkward. "There he is!" they shout, and they rush the stairs. "Oh, bloody hell..." mutters Palin-- he knows where this is going. Cleese goes all demented again, and kills another bunch of people, before Palin calms him back down. "Sorry," Cleese sighs, "See, I just get carried away... Sorry, everyone."

"Let's not bicker and argue
over who killed who."

As the guests cry for justice-- "He killed my Auntie!"-- Palin calms everyone down. "This is supposed to be a happy occasion. Let's not bicker and argue over who killed who." He reminds them that they're here for a wedding. Since the Bride's father is dead-- there's a reprise of "Bring out your Dead" again, when the Bride's father, (he of the sword through the head) manages, Rasputin-like, to recover. Inconvenienced, Palin continues his narrative as he surreptitiously has the Bride's father killed-- Palin adopts the Bride "in a very real, and legally binding sense." And with the Prince having fallen to his death (see, he had a plan all along,) Palin suggests that Lancelot step into the Groom's shoes, much to Lancelot's surprise.

Check out Idle (to the Prince's left)
with the Shakespeare bow.

But, in the twist on the twist, Lancelot is saved, by the Prince, who didn't die, but was (apparently) caught by a healed Concorde. Palin asked how he could have survived such a fall. "Well... I'll tell you," and the music starts. Agonized, Palin tries to stop the song, but you can't stop the beat! All the bloodied guests sing "He's going to tell..." Jones gets his song at last. Cleese, meanwhile, instead of just walking out with Concorde, decides to try a more dramatic exit, swinging on a rope. But he doesn't quite make it, and winds up dangling over the musical number. "Could somebody give me a push?"

Wedding Pre-Launcelot

Best... Quest... Ever! Once again, Cleese brings the hostility and the bloodshed, but in a cleverly constructed twist on the traditional "damsel in distress" trope. We get great character bits from Palin and Jones, and a couple of nice farcical turns from Idle. Gilliam and Jones create the backdrop of medieval mundanity against which this homicidal lunacy plays. A narrative with multiple characters playing across multiple scenes and locations give us a truly cinematic sense. The lads hit all the keys in this one, and it brings a spark of energy to a film that was starting to sag under its own episodic weight.To all surviving members of the Circus-- thank you for this sublime and inspired bit!

Wedding Post-Launcelot

Next?

We're back to King Arthur, prancing along, and back to cats getting beaten like rugs. Arthur and Bedevere arrive in a small town and try to coerce an old lady to give them a shrubbery by saying "Ni" to her. While the bit is not particularly good, Chapman is brilliant in a very meta way. He seems embarrassed, like a performer delivering groaner lines. Once they get the old lady on the ropes (after some much needed coaching-- Jones has difficulty remembering the magic syllable,) they find themselves surrounded by townsfolk-- one of them, Idle, a shrubber. I mean, what are the odds?

Problem easily solved, Arthur and Bedevere return to the freakishly tall Knight of Ni and his minions, with the shrubbery laid out with a little picket fence. Only now, the Knights have a new word--a multi syllable word that the script spells out as "Neeeow... wum... ping!" but it's pronounced something more like "Eki-eki-eki-eki-ptang!Zoo-boing! Zeboweeeshum..." New word, new demands. Passing through the forest will now cost them another shrubbery ("only slightly higher, so we get a two level effect, with a little path running down the middle...") and they have to cut down a tree with a herring.

Arthur has had enough of this silliness. He refuses, insisting "It can't be done!" And in saying so, he stumbles on the nemesis of "Ni", the word that "Ni" Knights can't hear, say, or abide. (The word is "it".) Every time Arthur says the word "it", the knights howl in agony. Then, Sir Robin shows up, with his minstrels still singing of his cowardice. As Arthur and Robin catch up, Robin drops a lot of "I" bombs, each one further destroying the Knights of Ni. They ride off, leaving the howling Knights behind.

A quick dialogue-less shot of the Historian's murder, as cops cover the corpse, and the Historian's Wife points the Detective in the direction of the armored assassin.

Foreshadowing...

Back to the proper story-- A Gilliamination gives us an animated link in true Gothic art fashion, with Palin's voice over essentially telling us that the band gets back together. We catch a quick glimpse of the Black Beast of Arrrrgh as the animated crew passes behind it, and we see a lot of gags."In the frozen lands of Nador, they were forced to eat Robin's minstrels-- and there was much rejoicing." A shepherd on a grassy knoll takes us through the passing of a bunch of seasons, and we fade back into "reality".

The Knights, all reunited, walk through a craggy mountain range. Suddenly, in a reprise of the "Exploding Version of the Blue Danube" huge fireballs erupt around them. The Knights realize that the source of the pyrotechnics is a hooded, antlered figure on a far peak. A gesture of his hand, and another explosion, and another, and another. Until the figure gestures towards himself-- and he explodes.

If the bit had ended there, it would have been pretty funny, but another explosion erupts right in front of the Knights, and Cleese steps out. He is the hooded, antlered figure-- he is the Enchanter they have been looking for since scene 24, and his name is... Tim? In a thick and overacted brogue, Tim and the Knights exchange information, their conversation punctuated by occasional displays of pyrotechnics as unmotivated as they are impressive.

Intimidated, Arthur can barely ask for help from the Enchanter, but Tim promises to take them to a special cave where directions to the grail can be found. "But," he warns them, spitting profusely with true theatrical muscle, "the cave is guarded by a monster so foul and cruel that no man has fought with it and lived! Death awaits you all, with big nasty teeth!"

"What an eccentric performance," Arthur whispers to Galahad.

We'll leave it there for now, as we have officially arrived to our third act. The Knights have gone on their separate quests, have reunited, and are now within striking distance of their goal, but the stakes have risen-- just as they would in a regular movie.

Tune in next time to see what the lads have in store for their big finish!

Next Week; The Climax!

The Most Holy Grail Part 3 - Fun and Games?

"Yes! Yes! Let him tackle us single-handed!... oh, shit!" - Carol Cleveland as Dingo, the Sultry Temptress

"Mynd you, moose bites Kan be pretti nasti..."
"You've got two empty halves of coconuts..."
"I'm not dead."
"Help! I'm being repressed!"
""Tis but a scratch."
"A duck!"

We're twenty minutes into the movie, and we've already seen about five classic bits, plus a deliriously baroque credit sequence, with tons of quotability. But we've still got an hour and ten minutes to go. Remember, the lads have been working together for years under the auspices of the BBC, and now they have the relative creative freedom that feature films afford. Though they will go further than they ever have before, they are also steeped in patterns of creative thought that we can recognize from their TV show. Let's strap on for the Fun and Games section of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, because all of that was just the set up. And if you haven't done it yet, Buy the Bloody Movie right now!

King Arthur is on the lookout for knights to join his Round Table in Camelot, with nothing more on his side than the loyal Patsy and an empty coconut split in two. He's met pedantic sparrow enthusiasts, a socialist couple in the mud and a murderous Black Knight, and pranced through a plague-ridden village and a literal witch hunt. But after all that, he's finally found his first knight, Sir Bedevere.

By the way, if you all don't have it already, pick up the Soundtrack here-- there is a great bit that follows up the witch trial, involving a professor of logic who critiques Bedevere's proposition, all while revealing the marital difficulties he and his wife are having. It's one of the best "album only" bits they have ever produced. I'll go into it in (more) length in the album breakdown, but if you haven't heard it, give it a listen here.

Look Out for the Gorilla, Fay!

The moment Arthur knights Bedevere freezes, and now we're in a book-- a book that can only have been designed by Terry Gilliam. Although he's left his imprint on every frame of the movie, and been in a number of them as well, this is the first we've seen of Gilliam's trademark visual style. Funny birds and animals cavort amongst Gothic titles as the cast of characters are introduced; Palin, as Galahad, Cleese as Lancelot, and Idle as Robin, (established forthright as a coward in the book's first joke,) as well as Sir Not Appearing in This Film ("Meta-Baby!") This book motif comprises out first attempt at structure, and we will return to it a few times over the course of the film. They've used it in some episodes of Monty Python, but it seems more to hearken back to old movies about even older times-- Check out, for instance, this credit sequence from "When Things Were Rotten" If Mel Brooks was doing it on television in the 70s, you know it had to be a thing.

But just as on the Flying Circus, the lads were not content with one layer of joke. We get a second layer, a detail in the margins. The pages of the book are turned by a feminine hand, which is ripped away by a giant gorilla hand. Fear not, though-- the gorilla continues to turn the pages in subsequent sequences. Like the random sightings of Vikings in early Python, so this love story between King Kong and Fay Wray plays out just off screen.

Ho Downs, Knightly!

The next bit is another stand alone sketch, a musical number about Camelot. Amidst silly discussions about the Medieval scientific view of the world, (not so Medieval actually-- there are people here in the states who probably believe the earth is banana-shaped,) they come upon... Camelot. Clearly, the castle of dreams, the pinnacle of human achievement, until Gilliam reminds them "It's only a model." This is the first wink at the audience, a reminder that all of this is just a movie. It's a shame for a purist such as myself, because it didn't have to be that line. It could have been "I've seen better", or "It doesn't have a spa" or "You still have to crap in a bucket." Something that undercut the grandeur in the same way, without shredding the fourth wall. But it still does the job, and it's kind of a goof that Gilliam gets the line-- after all, he built the model. Without further ado, they head towards Camelot.

Worst Musical Lighting Ever!

Inside the castle walls, dark, dank and "cozy", a poorly lit but obsequiously joyous musical number is taking place. The lads, voiced, one assumes, by the Fred Tomlinson Singers, sing a song that riffs on the word "table" and tries to find rhymes for "Camelot". ("We eat ham and jam and Spam a lot!") This feels like an Idle song, with all the clever rhymes, but the musical itself is all Jones. There's a static barbershop quartet pose, a kick line, and a tap dance sequence, all of it cut together with increasingly frenetic pace. We can barely hear the lyrics, so most of the humor comes from seeing knights in full armor being all musical. Of course, people (and cats) get hurt. They are kicked, stepped on, and coshed on the head, but the manic musical is completely indifferent to suffering. People clap along happily as the residual violence takes another life. (There's a quick cutaway to the dungeon, where Palin hangs by his wrists from a wall, and he claps along happily. Could this be the same dungeon denizen as in "Life of Brian"? "You lucky, lucky bastard.")

This number is actually very reminiscent of the Money Programme song, with knights instead of Dutch girls. However, Jones goes crazy in the editing suite, the cuts happening faster than the song can keep up with towards the end. Is this all a dig on the musical "Camelot", relatively current on the mid-70s? I suspect so. After all that lunacy, when the song is over, King Arthur, still outside with his loyal band, decides not to go to Camelot. "It is a silly place."

Now, as with the book, Gilliam returns to give us some structure. Out of the clouds, God appears, thunder rumbling behind him. God looks like a cross between Karl Marx and Rasputin, but the photographic inspiration for God was actually W.G. Grace, the Babe Ruth of cricket. (I can't type that without smiling.) He's beautifully backlit, with yellow eyes, ornate crown and little Kilroy fingers holding the clouds down. In a bit that sounds like Jones,

Separated at Birth?

(although the voice of God was Chapman, I hear), the knights below try to supplicate, and God yells at them. It turns out that God is fed up with all the Hosannas. "It's like those miserable Psalms, they're so depressing." I agree. And the hymns in the states are better than C of E hymns, which are nearly unbearable. (Thank you, Southern Baptists!)

But soon, we get to the real point of this scene-- the Quest. God tasks Arthur and his Knights to find the Holy Grail, and to have their search serve as an example in these dark times. We now have the thru line for the rest of the movie laid out, as we zero in on the quests of each knight. And once God's cloud door slides shut, like the doors in "Get Smart", Gilliam gives us angels blowing horns (some anally, with what I guess would be fart flugelhorns,) with a quick wave from Jesus, all coalescing into the title "The Search for the Holy Grail".

The last couple of bits haven't had the quotability that the first few got us. They've been funny, but not hysterical. But now, via a traveling montage of the full crew prancing across the countryside, with their pages providing the coconut-derived sound effects, we arrive at yet another castle. And behind the battlements lurks-- the French!

Farting in Your General Direction

This is the first multi-scene sequence in the film, and it demonstrates the difficulty of cobbling together a feature with no guiding principles apart from being silly. The stakes have escalated here, because now the knights are on a mission from God. And a goal changes everything. For those of you who aren't writers, here's a quick tutorial on narrative scene construction-- usually, what you want is a character, often called a hero, with a goal. Pursuing the goal leads the character into conflict, and seeing the hero deal with that conflict is where the joy of narrative typically resides. There are lots of exceptions to this, but for the purposes of this examination, let's assume this to be the rule. Now, let's see how this all plays out...

The knights approach the castle, the music getting tense, dramatic, building-- and then deflated by Gilliam's pathetic trumpet blare. Rebuilding the tension with silence, their entreaties are finally met with Cleese, playing a goofball Frenchman with what I assume to be historically accurate pointy head gear that makes him look like a pinhead, and gauntlets that stay perched on the battlement like cat paws. He says the castle belongs to his master, "Guy de Loimbard", a riff on Guy Lombardo, famous bland American band leader, and when King Arthur asks him to join the quest for the Grail, Cleese replies "He's already got one, y'see?" This is the type of thing you say to door-to-door salesmen-- do door-to-door salesmen still exist?-- and in fact whispers to his fellow soldiers "I told him we already got one." and they giggle. But Arthur is understandably confused and suspicious. He asks to see the Grail, but the Frenchman refuses.

Now, in past scenes, this is the point at which Arthur would give up and trot away, like he did at the first castle. But this time, he's got the Quest. He threatens to take the castle by force, and is met in response with the glorious French taunting. This is one of the most quotable sections of the movie, with Cleese peeling off one silly insult after another. "I fffffart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries." All in Cleese's "outrageous accent", with raspberries and goofy head-patting thrown in for good measure. The knights are more baffled than offended. "Is there someone else we could talk to?" The answer is no. Actually, the answer is a catapulted cow, followed by other livestock and gross things propelled over the battlements. The knights have no choice but to "Run away!" (In a nice bit of character differentiation, Cleese (as Lancelot) stays behind a moment after the others have retreated, hacking the stone walls with his sword. We'll see more of this behavior in a future sequence.)

Soundly defeated, the knights seek refuge behind a small hillock. But they haven't given up. Bedevere the Wise has a plan. And we fade from this scene to a time lapse, leading us to the second scene of this two scene sequence. 

It's later. Cleese silently mans the battlements, licking his chops. He hears strange sounds coming from surrounding forest. Sawing, hammering, clanging, a cat yelp. (Cats are having a rough time in this movie.) In addition to being a movie, this sequence is a master class in reactions, as Cleese pulls every trick in the book to indicate that he hears something strange out there. Finally, the sounds resolve into a squeaky wheel, and we cut away to an impressive wheel rolling over trees and bushes, back to Cleese reacting, cutting between them, until Cleese does an over the top doubletake, and we see... the Trojan Bunny, which rolls up to the castle, its ears flopping and buck teeth sticking out. The French soldiers accept it as a gift and take it in.

Back at the hillock, Arthur asks Bedevere what happens next, and it soon becomes apparent that Bedevere forgot a crucial part of the plan. There was supposed to be somebody in the Trojan Bunny. This resolution makes for a disappointing sequence. The plan wasn't that original to begin with, nor very likely to succeed. But being too incompetent to carry it out makes our heroes seem unworthy. They have dealt with the conflict, in accordance with the rules of narrative, but they have dealt poorly with it, and they spent so much time building it up. The bunny is silly, true, but overall, this sequence ends without living up to its promise. The French catapult the Trojan bunny at them, and it crashes on Neil Innes. Nothing for us to do but cut to the next scene.

We are saved by a Famous Historian who provides the momentum into the next bunch of sequences. The Historian tells us that the French taunting convinced Arthur to adopt a new strategy, wherein the knights would separate and have their own individual adventures. The Famous Historian is awesome-- old and natty, with disheveled hair and a lopsided red bow tie, but with such infectious enthusiasm and stilted hand gestures-- you can't help but love the guy.

Gratuitous Spurting

But the Pythons have a trick up their sleeve. A knight gallops out of nowhere and slices the neck of the Famous Historian with a swing of his sword before galloping off.  A woman, Mrs. Famous Historian? runs out, distraught, looking for help. This nice little bit of anachronism is more unsettling than funny. The blood is copious, and the Famous Historian seemed like an innocent child then the usual pomposity the Pythons usually attack. But this bit will give us the ending of the movie-- we just don't know it yet. It's less a joke than a conceptual bit of juxtaposition.

And now, we're employing the loopholes that the Arthurian tales allow us, getting out of the narrative (sort of) and back to the sketches, but the sketches serve the narrative (sort of).

His liver removed and his bowels unplugged...

First, the Tale of Sir Robin, as titled by Gilliam with a fire-breathing snake-bird for an "R". Palin's portentious voice over repeats what the Famous Historian already told us-- the knights have separated, and we're with Sir Robin, played by Idle, with a chicken on his shield crest. Idle rides through a forest, accompanied by his minstrels, who sing a ballad about his bravery. It's a great song-- did Idle write it, or Palin, or Cleese?-- but its descriptions of what Sir Robin isn't afraid of are so bizarre and graphic, they frighten Idle. They would frighten me, too. My nostrils raped? No thank you!

Neil Innes is back, as the minstrel, doubling as Idle's conscience. When Idle shuts him down, the forest suddenly gets much more frightening. They pass a bunch of signs warning of danger and certain death, a la "The Wizard of Oz". We get a call back to the anarcho-syndicists as they pass Robin going the other way, and we spy three dead knights impaled on a large lance. Something scary is up ahead, and Robin isn't too afraid to show he's afraid. Until, finally-- "Halt!"

Robin faces a gigantic three-headed knight, with (left to right) Jones, Chapman and Palin, all bearded and armored up. They ask Robin who he is and what he wants, and the minstrel keeps trying to answer in song. The minstrel thinks Robin is much braver than he is, so the songs are more bellicose than Robin would like, and he keeps shutting him up. But the damage is done-- the knight(s) want to kill him.

But who says three heads are better than one? The three heads bicker like three ill-tempered queens over nothing in particular, just sniping at each other. "Chop your own head off!" "Yes, do us all a favor." And when they finally come together on a course of action-- Robin is gone. "He's scampered." Cutting to Robin, the minstrels sing, this time about Robin's immense cowardice. "Brave Sir Robin turned about, and gallantly he chickened out." Robin insists he didn't. "All lies!" Or as we say now about inconvenient truths, "Fake news!"

While it's tempting to think that this was just another Python sketch mocking gay subculture (and they had a lot of them,) perhaps this was also a depiction of the frustration the lads increasingly felt with collaborative effort? Cleese was already off on his own, and Idle and Palin/Jones were pursuing their own projects. Who can say? Actually, Palin can say. Palin! Answer us! But overall, a nice sketch for Idle, showing off his Vietnam-era cowardice.

The next sketch, introduced by a reprise from the chanting monks, diving this time, in a Gilliamination of "The Tale of Sir Galahad". This bit is nice, very cinematic, and very well-written. It feels like a Palin sketch, and has a simple and powerful hook-- Sir Galahad the Chaste meets his Match. Matches, actually. Matches on his Mattress, to be blunt. Marches to a Mattress to Meat his Matches. Anyway...

We begin in a horrific storm, a veritable Tempest. Thunder and lightning and driving rains assault Palin, as Galahad, as he stumbles through the forbidding forest. Wolves howl in the distance, and all seems lost. But there, in the distance, shines a vision of the Holy Grail just over a castle. Palin straggles to the castle and gains entry, only to find himself surrounded by-- the French!

No, it's Carol Cleveland in a long, white gown, along with other (less) beautiful women, all carrying torches and beguiling expressions. "Welcome to the Castle Anthrax," she smiles. Palin asks about the Grail, and they seem to know nothing about it. But they all seem to want to sleep with him. Cleveland orders two of them (Midget and Crapper) to prepare a bed for Palin. "Thank you!" they say as they leave. "Thank you!"

Now this sounds like great news to me, but it's terrible news for Galahad the Chaste. He wants out of there, to save his vows, but Zoot reprimands him that it would be ungallant to refuse their generosity. She leads him upstairs, complaining about the dull life in Castle Anthrax-- "bathing, dressing, undressing, making exciting underwear." There's a nice scene, full of tension, where he allows them to lay him down and examine a wound he has received... but these women can't be trusted. "There's nothing wrong with that!"

Finally, he escapes from the bed, demanding to see the grail-- and he sees more grail than he wanted. He finds himself in the bathing room of the castle, surrounded by beautiful women in sheer white gowns, one of them damp and see through. As he runs out of the room, he finds Zoot again-- or Zoot's twin sister, Dingo, who suddenly remembers that that the castle beacon is grail-shaped--

And then, in a weird, unscripted and completely unnecessary aside (the sketch was gong just fine,)

Cleveland turns to the audience, breaking the fourth wall, and asks if the scene should have been cut. "We were so worried when the boys were writing it, but now I'm glad. It's better than some of the previous scenes, I think." Then we cut to characters from the previous scenes-- the three headed knight, who claims that his scene was "better visually," and Dennis the anarcho-syndicist, who claims that "At least ours was committed, and wasn't just a string of pussy jokes." (I missed the pussy jokes, but I assume names like Midget, Crapper, Zoot and Dingo, as well as maybe Anthrax, might have something to do with them. A google search turns up nothing. If I find anything, a future blog post is coming your way!) Then characters from future scenes-- Tim, the Enchanter and the attacking Mob, all scream "Get on with it!" When that doesn't work, God adds his Word-- "Get on with it!"

With a "You're no fun anymore" shrug, Cleveland continues the scene, insisting that, to make up for how naughty Zoot was by lighting the beacon, Palin should give them all a good spanking. "And after the spanking-- the oral sex!" That's apparently the kind of chastity that Galahad can stand. "Perhaps I could stay a bit longer..." But Lancelot shows up and rescues Galahad from the imminent peril, dragging the reluctant-to-leave knight away-- chased, but still chaste.

In my early viewings of the film, the long aside from Carol Cleveland was not in the cut, nor is it mentioned in the Holy Grail script/book, and it is such a misstep as to be one of the few times I prefer the shorter version. But it does raise the issue of the pussy jokes, and that intrigues me-- is Dingo really a word for vagina in London's swinging sixties? As in "A dingo regurgitated my baby!"

Apart from the aside, this is a solid bit-- not hysterical like the Black Knight sequence, but filled with an exquisite tension and conflict. Palin is great, the realization of the whole sequence is wonderful, and it ends with the third profane word in the movie, a second "Shit!" from Carol Cleveland, disgusted, frustrated and petulant. Great change of pace sketch, and unlike anything we've seen from Monty Python before.

We return to the book device, with the gorilla contritely turning the pages, and along with it, Palin's voice over pointing out a slight problem-- we are no closer to the Grail. The film isn't going anywhere. But the book shows us that next on the plate is... Scene 24! A scene wherein King Arthur and Bedevere meets with Gilliam as the Soothsayer, and according to Palin's V.O., "not more than a swallow's flight away... an unladen swallow, obviously..." in a digression that could only have been written by Palin, before the mob cuts in with yet another "Get on with it!' (Jones might have thrown in a reference to how good the acting is in the scene.)

The scene itself is nothing to write a blog about. It's played straight, with the bearded, cataracted, filth-smeared Gilliam cackling to Arthur and Bedevere about where to go to find the Grail. "Seek ye the Bridge of Death..." and then, he and the hut they're in disappear, in a weird Twilight Zone moment. And it is a well-acted scene, with Gilliam playing the inscrutable lunatic while Chapman earnestly tries to get the information from him. The tension is palpable. But before we continue...

We have a couple of threads that the lads are batting about like cats and string. There's the book device, the swallows argument, and "Get on with it!", all woven together into a one minute transitional bit. Though the story's not going anywhere, the lads are creating momentum with the increasing rate of call backs.

Now we get to the Knights who say "Ni" in what I suspect will be the most controversial part of this entire blog-- I don't like, and have never liked, the Knights who say "Ni". I say "No" to "Ni."

Compare this to the 3-Headed Knight shot above

Following the disappearance of the Soothsayer and his hut, Arthur and Bedevere wander through a scary forest, with strange figures creeping beyond the surrounding trees. It's almost exactly like the build up to Sir Robin's encounter with the three headed knight, only without the campy signs and three knights impaled on the lance. We're meant to take this more seriously. But, the sequence resolves the same way as before, with practically the same shot-- Arthur and Bedevere cowering and small on screen left, with a giant knight dominating screen right. This time, it's a very tall and black knight, played by Palin, who keeps screaming "Ni!"

Somehow, this word has a deleterious effect on Arthur and Bedevere, as Palin and his minions keep shouting it. They are the keepers of the sacred words "Ni", "Peng" and "Niiiii-wom." Palin tells us all this, sounding like a cross between a five-year-old Julia Child and a PTA president. Instead of building an impressive character, he went with demented fop, complete with massive facial tics reminiscent of Cleese's French soldier on the battlements, and twisting around inside his helmet so that his nose peeks out of the mouth aperture. He demands of Arthur and Bedevere-- a shrubbery. Orchestral bangs accompany this whole scene. Arthur agrees to get the shrubbery, and, well, that's pretty much it, for now. This is the first of this three scene sequence.

This is one of the most quoted bits in the whole movie, and for the life of me, I can't figure out why. It is silly, true, but it feels more random than inspired. The idea that there are mystical words that can cause discomfort or death is not particularly capitalized upon, now or later in the story. This whole thing feels like another unnecessary digression. They built it all up so dramatically, they costumed Palin and his minions, and I think that underneath Palin, Cleese may be standing, so as to give Palin some real height, ala the Archaeology Sketch. The lighting, the fog, the music, the extras, and all for this? However, others seem to really enjoy it, so, perhaps it's just me. I think that they could have done better, much better.

Yes... On a Horse... 

Now a quick cut to the dead Famous Historian, the woman standing over his corpse, and two bobbies investigating the death. Someone will pay for this foul deed.

So, how are they doing? Mixed bag, to be frank. They are still hitting with some excellent bits, and some scenes are showing tremendous cinematic promise. Camelot and Sir Galahad's Quest stand out as particularly bold cinematic flourishes, and then there's the Soothsayer scene, played entirely straight. They're running the risk of repeating themselves, as the three-headed knight and the Knights of Ni scenes indicate, but they're managing enough differentiation to keep it from feeling too stale. Plus, they're telling longer stories than just the stand-alone sketches they started out with. Their narratives are getting deeper. Though I wouldn't say that this section was as funny as the prior section, it has become clear that, at last, the lads have embraced the fact that they are making a movie, and they are trying to step it up.

There is some imminent peril here, beyond Galahad's peril of getting screwed to death. One of the trademarks of comedy is not being able to anticipate what will happen next, yet with dramatic structure, one needs to anticipate somewhat. But so far, the lads are managing to keep us guessing and surprised, and when the energy starts to flag, they start calling back prior jokes, creating little Easter eggs to keep us all alert, engaged, and laughing. The Knights who say "Ni" was a misstep, in my opinion, but it was relatively short. And at just over 40 minutes, we're almost halfway through the show.

And next comes one of my favorite, least quoted and ambitious sequences.

Next week; Part Three-- Bad Guys?