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Dom Robinson reviews 
- Cat.no: BBCDVD 1005
- Cert: PG
- Running time: 96 minutes
- Year: 1969/70
- Pressing: 1999
- Region(s): 2 (UK PAL)
- Chapters: 30 plus extras
- Sound: Mono
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: English
- Fullscreen: 4:3
- 16:9-enhanced: No
- Macrovision: No
- Disc Format: DVD 9
- Price: £19.99
- Extras : Scene index, Booklet, Biographies, Palindromes, Sing-a-long Lumberjack song, Photo Gallery, Radio Times: the original billing
Producers:
- John Howard-Davies and Ian MacNaughton
Animation:
- Terry Gilliam
Scriptwriters:
- The Monty Python Team
It’s !
- Graham Chapman
John Cleese
Terry Gilliam
Eric Idle
Terry Jones
Michael Palin
Monty Python’s Flying Circus, for anyone living with their head in the clouds for the past 31 years, was an irreverent comedy sketch show that ran from October 5th, 1969 to December 5th, 1974 and it would change the face of TV forever, blending bizarre humour with even more bizarre animation from Terry Gilliam, director of films such as Brazil and Twelve Monkeys
This compilation contains 28 sketches from the first series, prefixed by the opening titles and Michael Palin desperately crawling up to the camera after being thrown off the edge of the cliff and the closing credits are sandwiched inbetween a pet shop and a parrot.
The chapters, including the titles of the sketches on show, are :
- 1. Programme Start
2. Hell’s Grannies
3. Storytime
4. It’s the Arts
5. Pearl Harbour
6. Pram Animation
7. Self-Defence
8. Operation Animation
9. Come Back To My Place
10. Nudge Nudge
11. Kilimanjaro
12. Dirty Fork
13. Lingerie Robbery
14. Lion Tamer
15. Sheep
16. Bicycle Repair Shop
17. Falling Bodies
18. Three Buttocks
19. Albatross
20. Northern Playwright
21. Unwelcome Guests
22. The Funniest Joke in the World
23. It’s…Trees
24. Crunchy Frog
25. Nudity Animation
26. Upperclass Twits
27. Lumberjack Song
28. Pet Shop Sketch
29. End Titles
30. Parrot Sketch
Of the above, if I had to choose five favourites, they would be :
- Nudge Nudge: Smuttiness abound as Eric Idle winds up Terry Jones by asking if his wife is a bit of a “go-er”. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, knowworraimean? A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind bat.
Kilimanjaro: Cross-eyed eccentric John Cleese offers Eric Idle the chance to climb BOTH peaks of Mt. Kilimanjaro…
Dirty Fork: The late Graham Chapman complains about the dirty fork on the table in his restaurant of choice. He gets the back up of the waiter and manager, not to mention incurring the wrath of mad chef John Cleese.
Lumberjack Song: Michael Palin: he’s a lumberjack and he’s okay, but he’s got something else up his sleeve – and under the rest of his clothes.
Parrot Sketch: The one about the dead parrot. If you’ve never seen this sketch of John Cleese complaining to Michael Palin about the dodgy livestock on sale, you must be lying.
The one sketch I would have included? Quite simply, The Larch.
The picture quality isn’t perfect, but it’s as good as it’s going to get. Presented in fullscreen and artifact-free I certainly recommend it. If watching on a widescreen TV though, it’s perfectly comfortable to zoom the picture into 14:9. The average bitrate is a brilliant 8.17Mb/s, often holding steady close to 9Mb/s.
The sound is in mono and quite adequate with no complaints. The opening tune, Liberty Bell, still sounds as good today as it always did and for some reason, while hearing it at University in a drunken haze, I swore blind that the lyrics to “A finger of Fudge is just enough to give your kids a treat” fit the music exactly.
Extras :
Chapters : As stated before, there is a chapter for each sketch, plus top-and-tail’ers which makes 30.
Languages & Subtitles : The dialogue comes in English mono sound subtitles for the same language.
And there’s more : The Biographies provide brief onscreen info about how each of the crew got here today, there’s a 10-strong Photo Gallery, a selection of Palindromes to the programme’s theme tune, the Radio Times: Original Billing (very small but perfectly formed), a colourful Booklet containing plenty of info about the six Pythons and an excellent addition in the form of a Sing-a-long Lumberjack song. The mind boggles…
Menu : All the menus are animated and feature sound, usually imitating the wacky humour of the show’s creators. A more outlandish menu system you never did see.
Overall : This is definitely a fine compilation – with many more hits than misses – and serves as a perfect introduction for anyone who wants to get to know their comedy style. However, I hope the growth of DVD allows the BBC the chance to release the entire run of Python onto the shiny silver disc as they have done on video. There’s no substitute for chapter-per-sketch and I’ll look forward to what comes next.
Scheduled for March/April release are : Gormenghast, Walking with Dinosaurs and Tweenies.
As for which DVDs I’d like to see from the BBC in future. They include : Red Dwarf (in their original versions, not the remastered form), The Young Ones, Filthy Rich and Catflap, Fawlty Towers and – depending on whether I could bribe the new DG with enough cash – Eldorado… FILM : **** PICTURE QUALITY : **** SOUND QUALITY: *** EXTRAS: *** ——————————- OVERALL: ***½
Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2000.
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.