Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

One of the funniest movies ever made, 24 May 2005

Very few films can make me laugh out loud after I've seen them a dozen or so times. Monty Python and the Holy Grail is one of the exceptions. I can't help myself. Even though I know most of the movie by heart, I still laugh. The bits with the French guards at the castle, the Black Knight, the "Burn the Witch" mob, and the political discussions with the mud-collecting-peasants are as fresh today as the first time I saw the movie. It's silly, absurd, and totally ridiculous. But it works. I sincerely doubt I'll ever get tired of it.

Much of the reason I like the film so much is the decision on the part of Gilliam and Jones to play most of the movie straight. Graham Chapman plays King Arthur so deadly serious that it only makes the craziness around him even funnier. Had he played King Arthur for laughs, it wouldn't have been nearly so funny.

9/10