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Post by oh oooh on Mar 31, 2023 12:18:02 GMT
I'm surprised that there was never a film made of Spamalot. Which was very funny and did loads with musical theatre conventions. Idle has ground that one into the ground over several decades. Musicals, books, T-shirts....
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Post by harrylemon on Mar 31, 2023 12:56:58 GMT
I'm surprised that there was never a film made of Spamalot. Which was very funny and did loads with musical theatre conventions. Idle has ground that one into the ground over several decades. Musicals, books, T-shirts.... They've all ground the brand to dust over the years, just a bit surprised that he didn't do a film of it.
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Sneelock
god
you're gonna break another heart
Posts: 8,546
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Post by Sneelock on Mar 31, 2023 16:03:43 GMT
but, that's what's great about Python. If you are laughing you needn't put much thought into WHY you are laughing. People who aren't laughing have a much easier job the way I see it. they know why they aren't laughing - because it's not funny!
Cleese screwing up his face, ringing a little bell and saying "ting a ling a ling" kills me every time. why do I think it's funny? because I'm laughing? this seems as good an explanation as any.
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Sneelock
god
you're gonna break another heart
Posts: 8,546
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Post by Sneelock on Mar 31, 2023 16:10:56 GMT
I think I mentioned before that I saw it in a press screening. I needed some hours and the theater manager called me on the spot. I could pick up a couple of hours and all I had to do was let in some press who were invited to a press screening. the projectionist did the rest.
I took a buddy and it's a good thing I did or there would have been no sound in the audience at all save some grunts at Mr. Creosote & "live organ transplants" there were no more than 20 people in the audience and at least half of those left well before it was over.
I liked how What the Fuck the Gilliam bit at the beginning is and how it shows up later. I think it's their weakest feature but I like it a lot. it's sort of "and now for something completely different" except that everything actually was different and they had a lot of money to spend.
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Sneelock
god
you're gonna break another heart
Posts: 8,546
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Post by Sneelock on Mar 31, 2023 16:14:26 GMT
I had some weird cable channel that showed them at CANNES that year. I guess "...life" showed out of competition and they were the toast of the town. it was fun seeing people treating them like movie stars. as much as I liked "meaning of life", I saw Cleese on some program stating very dogmatically that "Brian" was their best feature and immediately agreed.
"meaning of life" is spotty. there are bits that go nowhere and characters that seem a little outside the performers' wheelhouse. still, it was great to have them back and putting out such a noisy, singular thing.
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Post by tory on Mar 31, 2023 17:54:49 GMT
Brian is genuinely one of the funniest films you'll ever see, but it is not one that bears fruit on repeated viewings.
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Post by Stacy Heydon on Mar 31, 2023 21:14:09 GMT
I guess you could say Grail is a bit like them doing a series of medieval sketches tied together by some vague Arthurian plot but I honestly don't understand how you wouldn't laugh. Because it's studenty humour. It's a bore. If I hear 'it's only a flesh wound' or 'your auntie smells of elderberries' in silly fucking voices one more fucking time I swear I'll hunt down the surviving Pythons and the results of my endeavours will be more than fucking 'flesh wounds' I can fucking assure you. You could say exactly the same thing about the tv series. People reciting the parrot sketch etc.
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Post by oh oooh on Mar 31, 2023 21:52:50 GMT
Because it's studenty humour. It's a bore. If I hear 'it's only a flesh wound' or 'your auntie smells of elderberries' in silly fucking voices one more fucking time I swear I'll hunt down the surviving Pythons and the results of my endeavours will be more than fucking 'flesh wounds' I can fucking assure you. You could say exactly the same thing about the tv series. People reciting the parrot sketch etc. Yeah, and the 'nudge nudge wink wink' thing, which I believe was tediously reenacted in student bars all through the 70s. You're not wrong. There are other examples. But what made the TV shows so special was the sheer wealth of ideas. If you didn't like one sketch then there'd be something else along in two minutes. There was no format! they were given free rein to do as they pleased, and they took advantage of it AND the shows were better for it. So you can cite a handful of sketches that became famous, but there's a huge amount of great stuff that remains relatively uncelebrated. There's probably a hundred things worth looking out for (if you watch all four seasons). Holy Grail has that bloody scene with Cleese looking over the castle wall, the thing with the 'armless' knight, and that bit with Palin talking about being oppressed. And what else? I mean, they're easily the most famous scenes, you see them all the fucking time, and they're (in my opinion) not particularly funny. I'm not sure what happened to them but that stuff has the smell of Eric Idle.
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Post by DayoRemix on Apr 7, 2023 10:21:43 GMT
Some of the acrimony towards these classics is surprising..Guess it's a Brit thing..If one doesn't laugh at "Every Sperm is Sacred" and it's aftermath, then something is wrong..Afraid it's scientific experiments for you all..
Brian is the most complete "Film", but there are funnier bits in the other two..
Sperm,Fishy Fish, "Oh Lord,please don't burn us" and the Salmon Mousse are the Meaning of Life highlights
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Post by oh oooh on Apr 7, 2023 11:02:34 GMT
Some of the acrimony towards these classics is surprising..Guess it's a Brit thing..If one doesn't laugh at "Every Sperm is Sacred" and it's aftermath, then something is wrong. THOSE WACKY GODDAMN BRITS! There's a difference in the way Brits and Yanks see Python, for sure. It's a complicated business and I'm not altogether clear on it myself - although I've seen lots of examples of it. Anyway I don't even want to attempt to describe what I've seen for fear of upsetting our US pals.
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loveless
god
Bringing ballet to the masses. Sticking to the funk.
Posts: 2,799
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Post by loveless on Apr 7, 2023 12:10:47 GMT
Some of the acrimony towards these classics is surprising..Guess it's a Brit thing..If one doesn't laugh at "Every Sperm is Sacred" and it's aftermath, then something is wrong. THOSE WACKY GODDAMN BRITS! There's a difference in the way Brits and Yanks see Python, for sure. It's a complicated business and I'm not altogether clear on it myself - although I've seen lots of examples of it. Anyway I don't even want to attempt to describe what I've seen for fear of upsetting our US pals. YOU TAKE THAT BACK! The Meaning of Life...you know, I haven't seen it since I was a teen, so - inevitably - it is forever frozen in my mind with the goodwill I had towards it when my face, my mind, and my very soul were riddled with acne. How I would regard the bits, the pacing, etc. now is impossible to say - though, the fact that "Sperm..." (less the tune than the bits surrounding it - the conversation about "French ticklers" and "Bloody Catholics", and of course the nonchalant standing birth/"delivery"), "Wafer thin..." comes to mind anytime one overindulges at the dinner table, and...the Grim Reaper's petulance with the dinner party...that all of this is etched in my brain either a) speaks well of the film, or b) indicates a broadness that may have suited me (sir) at the time, but may have aged less robustly than peak Python. It's (potentially) like the premise of a catchy tune that sticks with you for centuries - that this feature in itself is not a trademark of greatness. As for Python quoting nerds, it's a perfectly transatlantic annoyance as I met plenty in my teens/early twenties - and it was the sort of thing probably irked me every bit as much as the type of Dr. Who fan who felt that saying "EXTERMINATE!" with great purpose was a thing to be doing (these two may have always been the same person). I enjoyed Grail (specifically Innes' song about "Sir Robin")*, but would never have dreamed of going around and telling near strangers about "the knights who say 'Ni!'" or shrubberies. Spamalot was a hit here, of course. But, much as I seem to remember enjoying it, there's not a ton I could tell you about it nearly 20 years later. Quite possibly MY failing. I'm a dabbler at best, but...as with SCTV, it's impossible not to love and be awed by a major comedy franchise that - at its very heart - is so defiantly niche and really not only goes out of its way to pander to NO ONE, but almost reeks of "this is inside humor that might appeal to two people in the universe" when, of course, in spite of everything, it really does speak to something more universal. That they largely made the Rutles (Innes' baby) possible is no small gift to the world. And yet, Idle to me will always be tainted as someone who was needlessly cruel and petty towards Innes when they were in (legal, right?) conflict many years later.
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