Monday, Jun. 15 2009 @ 5:00AM
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By Chris Cummins
Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Homer went to college and his roommates endlessly quoted Monty Python and the Holy Grail? It rang true because the comedy of Monty Python has permeated every aspect of modern life. For proof, look no further than your inbox--the junk e-mail there is called "spam" because of a Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch. It's been 40 years since the Pythons first hit the airwaves and their blend of wit and absurdity hasn't lost any of its impact. Although John Cleese, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam occasionally reconvene for retrospectives, they have not performed as Monty Python in any substantial way since 1983. (Graham Chapman remains dead, and as such unavailable for any possible reunions). Remaining on good terms, the surviving members have each embarked on successful--if wildly uneven--solo careers. Featuring everything from unnecessary nudity to Bruce Willis, this list examines the best and worst non-Python projects by Pythons. Wow.
A brief disclaimer before we begin: the films, TV shows and books included here are strictly ones in which the ex-Pythons exercised some degree of creative control. In other words, that awesome episode of Cheers in which John Cleese played a marriage counselor is ineligible for inclusion here. (Though you can probably expect it to turn up in the inevitable The 5 Best (and 5 Worst) Projects Featuring Monty Python Members in Supporting Roles list).
THE BEST:
5) Time Bandits
Chocolate and peanut butter hog all the attention. A truly great combination is time travel and midgets. Remember this, future screenwriters out there: if you add these elements to your script, you are guaranteed a $70,000,000+ opening weekend--and that's a Topless Robot guarantee.* Co-written by Terry Gilliam and Michael Palin (and directed by Gilliam), Time Bandits is the greatest sci-fi/fantasy/comedy of the 1980s that isn't Ghostbusters. Blending undiluted imagination and great performances from the entire cast, the film is a contemporary classic that deserves way more love than it gets. Or that long-promised sequel.
*not a guarantee.
4) The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash
Six years before This Is Spinal Tap, The Rutles brought the rock mockumentary to America with this NBC telefilm about the "Pre-Fab Four." Refusing to rely on Weird Al Yankovic-style parody songs, Rutles creator Eric Idle and songwriter/performer Neil Innes crafted songs that could actually be Lennon and McCartney compositions...if the pair had better senses of humor. In fact, The Beatles' sound and style is spoofed so perfectly that you'd be forgiven if you thought that "Cheese and Onions" was an outtake from The White Album. Cameos abound from Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner and John Belushi that transport you back to the early days of Saturday Night Live, and the portrayal of a Yoko Ono type as a member of the Gestapo is easily the most subversive thing to appear on TV in the late 1970s. If you somehow haven't seen this yet, definitely pick it up. Just be sure to avoid the sequel, more on that in a bit.
3) A Fish Called Wanda
A Fish Called Wanda is a wonderful dark comedy/crime caper that everyone enjoys. Except stutterers. And animal lovers. Those killjoys! The Python with the best solo track record, John Cleese, wrote and co-starred in this 1988 effort as a restrained lawyer who rediscovers life after he gets mixed up with American jewel thief Jamie Lee Curtis. Sadly, he also has to deal with her stupid--though don't call him that--boot-huffing lover, Kevin Kline. (Whose performance earned him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar--a rare honor bestowed upon him by the notoriously comedy-shafting members of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences). Kline may have gotten the glory, but Michael Palin steals the film as the stammering fish enthusiast who finds his inner confidence through running over his nemesis with a steamroller.
2) 12 Monkeys
Is Terry Gilliam a visionary or an overrated director whose
perfectionism impedes his ability to tell captivating stories? His recent films
may indicate the latter, but the dude also made Brazil, Fear and
Loathing in Las Vegas, The Fisher King and 12 Monkeys. Using
Chris Marker's La Jetée as a starting point, this movie throws big ideas at the
audience about mental illness and the always tricky predestination vs. free
will debate. It's also a gripping sci-fi adventure that is deliberately
ambiguous. Just as there as no easy answers for Bruce Willis' James Cole
character, audiences are left pondering humanity's fate at the film's end.
Exactly what does it mean when that future chick tells the airplane
bioterrorist that she's "in insurance"? Was the Bob character another time
traveler, or did he exist solely in Cole's mind? Who else thinks Brad Pitt's
performance is excessively over the top? These questions continue to divide
viewers, and Gilliam wouldn't have it any other way.
1) Fawlty Towers
To quote Arnold Rimmer, "the world loves a bastard." Thus the continuing appeal of Basil Fawlty and his horrific Torquay hotel. Constant BBC and PBS repeats make it seem like the number is greater, but only 12 episodes of the series were made. During production, stars/co-creators John Cleese and Connie Booth took great lengths to ensure that the quality of the program didn't decline. By refusing to milk their comedic cash cow until it was dry, the pair quit while they were ahead and Fawlty Towers remains the gold standard by which other Britcoms are compared.
Hit the jump for the worst Python solo projects ever made.
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40 comments
Comments
Revelo said:
Naturally Fawlty Towers is the best project. it's awesomeness and amounts of funny are too many to count. But yes, Graham Chapman dying did put a big wrench in things.
giberwitz said:
The best cameo in The Ruttles has got to be George Harrison as the interviewer.
Ciaran said:
Graham Chapman's death? Tragic.
Graham Chapman's eulogy? Possibly the single greatest moment in the last 40 years of British history.
Tristriam said:
I think I will go watch the Parrot Sketch. And the silly walk just for good mesure.
bort said:
"Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Homer went to college and his roommates endlessly quoted Monty Python and the Holy Grail?" Tch, yeah. Do you even have to ask?
bort said:
Also, I think Brazil was way better than Time Bandits. I have not seen 12 Monkeys yet though.
The Weaver said:
I can't even count how many times I've watched Time Bandits. My mother just bought it for me on DVD a few years ago, and watching it is like having a childhood friend over for tea.
Perhaps my favorite observation of the movie is that no one addresses the characters as "midgets" or any other derogatory term. They just happen to be very small time travellers. Makes sense to me.
Can anyone interpret the ending for me though? I'm as confused now as I was when I was 4.....
Zach T. said:
"Brazil" doesn't TOP the good list?!? Easily the BEST Terry Gilliam film (though "12 Monkeys" and "Time Bandits" would probably make spots 2 and 3 on my ranking of his films). If you've only seen the edit of "Brazil" that was originally released here, suffice to say that the ending was cut short to make it more marketable to American audiences and Gilliam's preferred ending (a far darker one) that happens a few minutes later in the UK version/director's cut is far better.
And I dunno if Graham Chapman's death is the WORST non-Python project from the group... I'd say more their involvement in the abysmal Hitchhiker's Guide movie that was finished by those other guys when Douglas Adams died resulting in a horribly jarring mix of Douglas Adams' brilliant comedy and not bad, but utterly American filler jokes. I'm not sure what involvement members of the troupe had beyond Eric Idle's "So Long and Thanks for All the Fish" song, but that movie missed the mark so badly that even just that much involvement makes it easily the nadir of the solo-Python oveure since it seems to be a stamp of approval from them.
Also, Chapman's death gave us the funniest eulogies out there, so that definitely makes it less of a bad thing than some of these, especially when you stop to consider the side-splitting urn sketch at that one reunion...
cummins said:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsHk9WC7fnQ
There is John Cleese eulogizing Chapman. That more than makes up for the depressing Douglas Adams clip.
gpaine said:
As an English teacher I have to mention the major disappointment of John Cleese as Petruchio in the BBC version of Taming of the Shrew. Granted this entire BBC project from the 80's is now dated, but I was so looking forward to showing this to my students and told them how funny John Cleese of Monty Python would be. He was awful and made the entire thing even more painful to watch. It is hard to screw up such good material and he did.
cummins said:
Zach -
Actually, the Pythons had nothing to do with that horrible Hitchhiker's film--instead, scriptwriter Karey Kirkpatrick decided to make his script in his words "Monty Python in Space." It should be noted that the proposed Hitchhiker's film in the 1980s (that was to have starred Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd) never got off the ground because Ivan Reitman wanted it to be "Monty Python in Space"--much to Adams' dismay. Although he was a friend and sometimes collaborator with the Pythons, he was eager to prove that his work was entirely original and not just merely aping Pythons style. The lamely "Pythonesque" parts of the Hitchhiker's film (including the opening song) are just further proof that the creative team were busy paying lip service to the fans and they missed the point of the source material. Ex-They threw out Adams script! They think the end of the universe is a direction! Slapstick comedy!
Zaphod only had one head? Fuck that noise.
My rambling point here is that the film caused much anger, but none of it should be directed at the Pythons. Save it for Garth Jennings and Karey Kirkpatrick.
Mount_Prion said:
Brazil was much better than 12 Monkeys. 12 Monkies ain't bad, but it's just not on that level. And if you want to compare supporting characters, the over-the-top Brad Pitt has NOTHING on Robert De Niro as a renegade plumber.
LAY said:
Good list. However, Fish Called Wanda should have been the top. Absolute comedic masterpiece.
"Asshole!!"
Hachiko said:
I'm surprised Cleese's brutally unfunny "How to Irritate People" wasn't on the "worst" list.
Saffer said:
That was a good list until I got to the last one. Now I'm just sad.
Anon said:
Hachiko: or his equally unfunny film, Clockwise
Zach T. said:
cummins: Well, Eric Idle writing that song for it is still him giving it his seal of approval, so it still fits with my classification at least even though he had nothing else to do with it.
BorgQueen said:
Supposedly, Brad Pitt's "over the top" performance in 12 Monkeys was a result of him quitting smoking to try to get that on-edge, twitchy thing down for his character. Random fact.
Drunken Fist said:
@ gpaine: I was thinking the same thing when I began reading this list. The interpretation they went with for that version of "Shrew" made for a dismal failure of a film, and it all hinged on Cleese's role. Instead of embracing the comedic elements of the play, he went with the overbearing asshole approach, with no comedy whatsoever. It really did make for a putrid film. Whether that was Cleese's decision, or the director's, it was the wrong one, no doubt about it. (Of course, now that I think of it, Cleese may have directed it, too. Been so long since I watched it, I don't recall.)
cummins said:
As far as I know, Joby Talbot, Garth Jennings and Christopher Austin were the sole composers of "So Long and Thanks for all the Fish." It certainly sounds like an Idle song though (which is part of my argument for how the flick apes Python). Did Idle write it uncredited? If so, I offer a humble my bad for the misinformation. Regardless, I still hate that song.
Zach T. said:
cummins: I guess I've been unfairly maligning Eric Idle for a few years now, as around the time the movie came out I heard from multiple sources that the song had been written by him. Now that I go back and double-check the sources, it turns out that they were incorrect and I was remembering misinformation.
Glad to find out that I was wrong, though.
Hachiko said:
When the list of Best/Worst Supporting Roles comes out, I wonder if Eric Idle's Wreck-Gar turn will be listed positively or negateively.
I vote "Best of".
laurie b. said:
Brazil was fantastic. Heck, even the Adventures of Baron Munchausen is pretty good -- I watched it years after it was universally panned and I wonder why it was hated when it was first released. Terry Gilliam simply rocks.
I'm surprised you didn't link to any of John Cleese's corporate communication videos. I don't know if they are bad or not, I just feel sad that he made them.
If you ever make that Worst Monty Python Cameo list, I nominate Michael Palin in "You've Got Mail." All his scenes ended up on the cutting room floor, thus giving this movie no good reason for existing.
chad said:
i would have switched time bandits and twelve monkeys around and glad to see fawlty towers on the good list. as for the worse list nothing tops chapman's death and thus denying python fans what could have been if he was still alive. and everything else on the worse list is a good fit. for not everything the python members did was good
DaveH said:
Honestly, I don't think top 5 covers either best or worst adequately. They've all done so much good and bad...
I'd add Labyrinth, Brazil and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas to the good side for sure, and put Brothers Grimm, Erik The Viking, Burn Hollywood Burn, and Spamalot tour on the crap side.
Erin said:
I just watched Life of Brian last night and was thinking how the world is a little less funny without Graham Chapman. If you have the 2-disc Life Of Brian listen to the Pythons read their own script and crack themselves up...it's magical and heart warming :)
Captain Flunky said:
Not hate for Fierce Creatures? Just caught it on HBO and forgot how retched it was.
Capsulesn'Coffee said:
No Brazil?
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas while not deserving of the the awfulness of bottom five,is still not one of the/a ex-pythons better outings. I'm all for H.S.T but the movie was a train wreck, despite a of handful brilliant moments.
rj472 said:
What about "Yellowbeard" with Graham Chapman in the title role?
timbizcut said:
An honourable mention should go to Michael Palin and his "Ripping Yarns" series.
simon number nine said:
what no Ripping Yarns in the best of?Schooldays is the best thing Palin ever did,that and Jabberwokky.Cleese is such a bore these days you can hardly believe its the same person,as for Chapman the last thing the old drunk did was an Iron Maiden video!i fear the only ones who went on to better things were Jones and Gilliam,best noy to think about Idle
unlucky13 said:
Graham Chapman jokes.... Too soon..
Gizmondo23 said:
WTF, Brazil should be on the best list!
monkey boy said:
brothers grimm? terrible film! shoulda been on the worst.
supergodmasterforce said:
Another vote for 'Brazil' here - and definitely 'Ripping Yarns' deserved a shout as did 'Fisher King'
It might be a little too obscure but Michael Palin was outstanding in G.B.H.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.B.H._(TV_series)
supergodmasterforce said:
Another vote for 'Brazil' here - and definitely 'Ripping Yarns' deserved a shout as did 'Fisher King'
It might be a little too obscure but Michael Palin was outstanding in G.B.H.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.B.H._(TV_series)
"Starman" Matt Morrison said:
@Hachiko I imagine "How to Irritate People" isn't on the list because it was made BEFORE Monty Python's Flying Circus.
Incidentally, the used car salesman skit from that show is a proto-version of what would become The Dead Parrot skit.
Trism said:
I live about 10 miles away from Torquay and have been to the Fawlty Towers hotel (as a sort of pilgrimage you know?), the outside still looks exactly the same, although the sign board is gone =o(
Ian P said:
Can we at least agree that despite the wretchedness of Romance with a Double Bass, Connie Booth was incredibly hot in the 70's...God, Polly was sexy, lol!
Prof3ss0r said:
-"Unless droll jokes about cricket and the British press tickle your funny bone. "
They certainly Do! :)
