10 Films to Watch if You Like: Monty Python's Life of Brian

Back in cinemas for the Easter period, Monty Python's Life of Brian still has the power to amuse and antagonise. Ranked among the funniest screen comedies and one of the best British films ever made, this biblical romp has also been branded blasphemous and offensive. Cinema Paradiso examines what all the fuss is about.

Few films have provoked more controversy. Or raised more laughs. Over 35 years have elapsed since work started on Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979) and there were moments when it seemed as though it would never be made. Indeed, John Cleese signed up to co-star with Peter Sellers in Richard Quine's The Prisoner of Zenda (1979) because he thought the project had collapsed. But someone seemed to be looking down on the enterprise. as though ex-Beatle George Harrison had friends in high places.

Lust For Glory

It was by no means obvious that there would be a follow-up to Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). The Scottish shoot hadn't been particularly enjoyable. Co-directors Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam had frequently been at loggerheads, as a result of which, fellow Pythons Michael Palin, Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, and John Cleese had endured varying degrees of disgruntlement. The latter had been coaxed back into the fold after having baled out of the fourth and final series of Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969-74). But he was already working with ex-wife Connie Booth on Fawlty Towers (1975-79), while Palin and Jones were co-writing Ripping Yarns (1976-79). Gilliam was preparing to make his solo directorial debut with the Lewis Carroll-inspired Jabberwocky (1977), while Idle was collaborating with Neil Innes on Rutland Weekend Television (1975-76), a much-maligned sketch show (that is long overdue a release on disc) which would spawn The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash (1978), an affectionate spoof on the rise and fall of The Beatles.

While some of the troupe were in Amsterdam promoting Holy Grail, Idle grew tired of fending off questions about the next Python project and blurted out that they were developing a biblical epic entitled, Jesus Christ: Lust For Glory, This was a play on Patton: Lust For Glory (1970), Franklin J. Schaffner's Oscar-winning biopic of General George S. Patton. But, while the assembled journalists laughed off the idea, it appealed to the other Pythons, whose shared mistrust of organised religion made the notion of parodying the New Testament highly appealing.

Idle had joked about a scene in which onetime carpenter Jesus Christ complains about the shoddy workmanship on his crucifix. But, the more the Pythons studied the Gospels, the more they realised that Jesus was a decent man who talked sense and, therefore, wasn't a great source of comedy. The focus shifted on to a 13th apostle, who kept turning up late for miracles and missed the Last Supper because his wife had invited friends over for drinks and he couldn't get away. However, The Gospel According to St Brian also foundered on the problem of how to integrate the Son of God. 'My feelings towards Christ are that he was a bloody good bloke,' Terry Jones recalled later, 'even though he wasn't as funny as Margaret Thatcher.' He was reluctant to do a film set in 33 AD because he thought 'the costumes would be so boring'. But Cleese was also convinced that they needed to find another protagonist. 'The moment you got really near the figure of Christ,' he later explained, 'it just really wasn't funny because Christ was wise and flexible and intelligent, and he didn't have any of the things that comedy is about - envy, greed, malice, avarice, lust, stupidity.'

Eventually, the Pythons hit upon a story about someone who was born in the same time and place as Jesus and has to deny that he's the Messiah after repeatedly being mistaken for him. Writing in earnest started around Christmas 1976, with the initial draft being completed by the summer. Jones was concerned that the screenplay lacked coherence, however, as he tended to collaborate with Palin, while Cleese and Chapman worked together and Idle wrote alone. Recalling the immense and complex nature of the first draft, Jones knew that 'much of this material had to be dropped, or the movie would have lasted three and a half days!'

Among the skits to be jettisoned was a scene of Joseph explaining the Virgin Birth to his mates in the pub. Another showed King Herod attempting to track down the Infant Jesus. Wrap-around sequences set in a public school were also dropped, although 'All Things Dull and Ugly' and 'The Martyrdom of St Victor' resurfaced on Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album (1980), while the Boys vs the Masters rugby match was recycled for Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (1983).

In January 1978, therefore, the Pythons came together in Barbados for a fortnight of script polishing and water-skiing. All agreed that this was a masterstroke, as it ensured that everyone had an equal stake in the scenario. Moreover, it helped rebuild bridges between the members of the group, as they rediscovered the pleasure of working together.

It wasn't all hand-crafting jokes, however. Keith Moon, the drummer of The Who, turned up to play Scrabble with Palin, Cleese, and Chapman. The latter also invited entertainer Des O'Connor to join the party, which was completed by Mick Jagger, the frontman of The Rolling Stones, who was friends with Idle. Chapman recalls them playing charades and Jagger resorting to graphic imagery in order to mime Shaft in Africa (John Guillermin, 1973).

Although pleased with the screenplay, the Pythons were aware that problems still lay ahead. Social campaigner Mary Whitehouse and the Nationwide Festival of Light had recently brought a successful prosecution for blasphemy against Gay News for a poem about a centurion at Calvary having erotic thoughts about the crucified Christ. Consequently, they showed the script to John Mortimer (the lawyer behind Rumpole of the Bailey, 1978-92), who had represented Gay News in court. Moreover, they sought the advice of a canon at St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle. He concurred that the script avoided blasphemy in 'extracting the maximum comedy out of false religion and religious illusions'. According to some sources, the canon even came up with the stoning sequence, which would outrage Jewish leaders in the United States.

Cohen For a Song

Born so close to Jesus in Bethlehem that he is mistaken for the Messiah by three wise men from the East, Brian Cohen (Graham Chapman) is raised by his prostitute mother, Mandy (Terry Jones). Even though women are barred, she would rather go to a stoning than listen to Jesus (Kenneth Colley) deliver the Sermon on the Mount, as they are right at the back and can't hear what's being said.

Appalled to discover that he is half-Roman, Brian chucks his job selling snacks at the colosseum and applies to join the People's Front of Judea, which is opposed to the Roman occupation. He is more interested in the zealous Judith Iscariot (Sue Jones-Davies) than the anti-imperialist ideas espoused by Reg (John Cleese) and his cohorts, Francis (Michael Palin) and Stan (Eric Idle), who wants to identify as a woman named Loretta and have babies. However, Brian agrees to undertake a mission to daub 'Romans Go Home!' in Latin on the palace wall and winds up having to write it out 100 times by a grammatically punctilious centurion (Cleese).

Pursued by soldiers next morning, Brian seeks sanctuary at the PFJ's headquarters and interrupts a meeting about the benefits that Rome has brought to Judea. He's ordered to join a kidnap attempt on the wife of Roman governor Pontius Pilate (Palin). But they run into the Campaign For a Free Galilee on a similar mission and Brian is arrested. He's brought before Pilate, but his rhotacism and the name of his high-ranking friend, Biggus Dickus, causes so much mirth among the guards that Brian is able to escape.

Having been swept up by an alien spaceship, Brian tries to buy a false beard as a disguise and receives both a lesson in haggling and a free gourd. He poses as a preacher in order to evade a Roman patrol and so intrigues a small audience with his muddled rehashing of Jesus's parables that they follow him into the desert, convinced he's the Messiah. They turn on a hermit (Jones) who breaks an 18-year vow of silence when Brian stands on his foot and he uses the commotion to sneak away to find Judith.

After a night of passion, Brian discovers that the crowd has followed him home and it refuses to disperse even after Mandy has reassured them that her son is not the Messiah, but a very naughty boy. The PFJ hail him as a hero, although they put up little resistance when Brian is arrested and sentenced to crucifixion. As it's the custom to release a prisoner to mark the Passover, the mob calls out names that expose Pilate and Dickus's respective speech impediments. Despite Judith persuading people to shout for Brian, he is raised on a cross with several other prisoners. Despairing of being rescued, he joins in when Mr Cheeky (Idle) tries to cheer him up by singing, 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life'.

Here Comes the Fun

EMI had first become involved in cinema in 1969, when executive Bernard Delfont had appointed director Bryan Forbes to supervise an ambitious slate of films to be made at the newly acquired Elstree Studios. Among the titles were Basil Dearden's The Man Who Haunted Himself, Andrew Sinclair's The Breaking of Bumbo, Robert Fuest's And Soon the Darkness, Lionel Jeffries's The Railway Children (all 1970), Frank Nesbitt's Dulcima, Reginald Mills's The Tales of Beatrix Potter, and Joseph Losey's The Go-Between (all 1971).

Mixed box-office returns cost Forbes his job and EMI merged with the Hollywood giant, MGM. Despite the glamorous association, the only hit during this period was Mike Hodges's co-production, Get Carter (1971), and EMI found itself in a new partnership with Anglo-Amalgamated. Success came with such bawdy comedies as Ralph Thomas's Percy, Harry Booth's On the Buses, and Bob Kellett's Up Pompeii (all 1971) before the company went up market with Claude Whatham's Swallows and Amazons and Sidney Lumet's Murder on the Orient Express (both 1974), which earned the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Ingrid Bergman.

Such prestige failed to keep Nat Cohen in his job, however, and Michael Deeley and Barry Spikings took over EMI's film wing after it merged with British Lion in 1976. While they backed local products like Tom Clegg's Sweeney 2, the pair sought to invest in American productions and struck lucky with Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), John Guillermin's Death on the Nile, Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver, and Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter (all 1978), which won five Oscars, including Best Picture.

Given the need to keep things sweet with Hollywood, it was perhaps unsurprising that EMI reneged upon an agreement struck with producer John Goldstone to fund Life of Brian to the tune of $4.5 million. By all accounts, Delfont got round to perusing the script and realised that the subject matter could be highly contentious. As Terry Gilliam recalled, 'They pulled out on the Thursday. The crew was supposed to be leaving on the Saturday. Disastrous. It was because they read the script...finally.' But the decision seems rooted less in moral scruple than in risk aversion, as such a provocative material might jeopardise EMI's cosy relationship with Hollywood by antagonising America's conservative religious groups.

The project appeared doomed, even though work was well advanced on the sets on the Tunisian peninsula of Monastir. By a quirk of fate, the art directors had recycled sets that had been built for Franco Zeffirelli's small-screen series, Jesus of Nazareth (1977), which had been produced by Delfont's brother, Lew Grade. But they lay empty, while a frantic search began for an alternative source of funding.

Ex-Beatle George Harrison (who had recorded at EMI's Abbey Road Studios on the company's Parlophone label) was a known fan of Monty Python and had palled up with Eric Idle after singing 'The Pirate Song' on Rutland Weekend Television. He had even guested in The Rutles as a TV reporter. So, Idle thought it was worth asking Harrison if he could help out. Much to Idle's surprise, he not only agreed to come aboard, but he also remortgage his Henley home at Friar Park and set up HandMade Films with business manager Denis O'Brien in order to raise the budget.

As one of the Fab Four, Harrison had witnessed the wrath of the Bible Belt at first hand, after John Lennon had claimed that the band was 'bigger than Jesus' in 1966. As is shown in Bob Smeaton's The Beatles: Anthology (1995), records and memorabilia were burned in a backlash that extended to a blackout by Christian radio stations. But Harrison, who was a deeply spiritual man, had no qualms about putting his hand in his pocket. He wanted to see the film and was quite prepared to buy what Terry Jones called 'the most expensive movie ticket of all time'.

Idle later joked, 'I didn't believe you could pick up a film for $4 million. I didn't know how loaded George was.' Moreover, he took a pot shot at Delfont in the outro to 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' by saying, 'I said to him, Bernie, I said, they'll never make their money back.' In gratitude, the Pythons asked Harrison to play Mr Papadopoulos, the owner of the Mount, who is briefly glimpsed in a crowded room. Palin dubbed his sole utterance - a densely Scouse 'ello' - although there was a rumour that he would also have appeared in a cut sketch about the seating arrangements for a last supper.

Neil Innes also had to settle for a cameo, as the schedule delay meant he had to start work on the BBC series, The Innes Book of Records (another one that really should be available on disc). He had been due to play the giggling guard at Pilate's palace, but had to settle for being the Samaritan who causes the colosseum gladiator to have a heart attack by running around the arena. An even briefer vignette involved a preacher who is spurned by the crowd brandishing Brian's sandal and gourd. He was played by ex-Goon Spike Milligan, who had dropped by the set while visiting the battlefields where he had fought during the Second World War, and which are recalled in Norman Cohen's Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall (1972).

George Lazenby, who had been James Bond in Peter R. Hunt's On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1967), had been John Cleese's choice to play Christ. But the others felt such stunt casting would be an unnecessary distraction and Kenneth Colley preached the Sermon on the Mount. Cleese also missed out on the role of Brian. Although he acknowledged that Graham Chapman was the better actor and had held Holy Grail together as King Arthur, Cleese fancied playing the protagonist. He was also concerned by his old Cambridge friend's alcoholism. But Chapman dried out prior to shooting and Cleese was later glad that the other Pythons had dissuaded him from attempting Brian.

Chapman also served as location doctor, when shooting commenced on 16 September with the stoning sequence, which sees Mandy and several other women don false beards and lower their voices in order to get round the Jewish law forbidding females from attending public executions. It set the tone for the next two months, as everyone hit peak form at the same time and revelled in the experience. They particularly enjoyed working with the local extras, many of whom had appeared in Jesus of Nazareth. Jones was amused to be repeatedly told, 'Mr Zeffirelli wouldn't have done it like that, you know.' Cleese was equally enthusiastic: 'The 450 Tunisian extras were sensational. When they fell to the ground laughing, it was one of the funniest sights I had ever seen. They fell in waves, like something out of a Land-based Esther Williams movie.'

Even Terry Gilliam had fun, despite being forced to settle for supervising the look of the film rather than calling the shots. 'I loved playing the jailer,' he divulged. 'It was another case of I'll do a grotesque character - skull split open, wearing awful stuff - because the others wouldn't.' He also explained, 'That sequence with Mike and Eric was one of the few instances of ad libbing; Python didn't ad lib because John didn't like it - he's a fundamentalist when it comes to humour, ironically.'

He got a bit cranky when Jones didn't make the most of interiors like Pilate's palace. But Gilliam created the matte paintings for the Nativity nightscape and the 'Romani ite domum' graffiti effect. He also got to handle the alien abduction, which zanily cashed-in on the vogue for sci-fi sparked by George Lucas's Star Wars (1977) and which required a hand-built model spaceship and plenty of pyrotechnics.

This was filmed in London under unusual circumstances, as Chapman's tax situation meant that he could only stay in the UK for a single day. 'I arrived in the morning from Los Angeles,' he told an interviewer, 'and was driven straight to the studio. I was put into the box, made up to resemble a spaceship, with lights and wires. I was dressed as Brian, shaken around a lot, and then taxied back home for a few hours' sleep before being put on another plane to LA...For a week after that, I didn't know where I was in the world, the time, space, or anything.'

Filming ended on 12 November 1978 and a private screening of a two-hour rough cut was held two months later. As a result of test screenings, 13 minutes were excised. An opening shot of Palin, Idle, and Jones eulogising about sheep was ditched, along with the bid to kidnap Pilate's wife. A strand centring on Zionist Otto, the Germanic leader of the Judean People's Front who sports a Hitler moustache, couldn't be removed entirely, however, as his crack suicide squad kill themselves at the foot of Brian's cross and their corpses can be seen in subsequent shots. But the Pythons (with the exception of Gilliam) agreed that they were rattling enough cages without needling the Israeli political establishment. Even without these scenes, however, all hell was about to break loose.

Very Naughty Boys

As there were no blasphemy laws in the United States, it was decided to launch Life of Brian at five theatres on 17 August 1979. It took $140,034 on opening weekend and went on to become the year's highest-grossing British film ($19,398,164) in the US. The reviews were largely positive. But the reaction of the various religious organisations was predictably hostile. The Lutheran Council denounced the film as a 'profane parody'. while the Rabbinical Alliance considered it 'foul, disgusting and blasphemous', largely on account of the fact that John Cleese was wearing a prayer shawl in the stoning sequence.

Surpassing all in its quiet fury, the Catholic Film Monitoring Office proclaimed it a sin even to see the film. Nuns and rabbis picketed the cinema in New York, prompting Terry Gilliam to joke, 'I thought at least getting the Catholics, Protestants and Jews all protesting against our movie was fairly ecumenical on our part.' Cleese told a talk show host, 'They actually made me rich. I feel we should send them a crate of champagne or something.'

Right-wing New York Post columnist William Buckley let slip that he hadn't seen the film before lambasting it by announcing that Monty Python himself gets crucified at the end. Graham Chapman responded: 'It is pretty interesting that these various church organisations all felt comfortable complaining about the movie without seeing it. But then that's the prerogative of a bigot.'

Despite the protests, the film was shown across the States. It was barred from Ireland for eight years, however, while Swedish exhibitors exploited the embargo by its neighbour to advertise Brian with the slogan, 'The film so funny that it was banned in Norway.' Several town councils refused to sanction screenings when the feature opened in Britain on 8 November. Even boroughs without cinemas issued injunctions, with Harrogate council admitting that it had based its decision solely on advice from the Nationwide Festival of Light.

Michael Palin took exception to the hysterical nature of some of the objections. 'Someone called Allatt wrote to The Times,' he recalled, 'to say he hadn't seen the film, but he was against everything it stood for. We should have written back and said, "We've never met Mr Allatt, but we don't like him."' Indeed, he became so incensed by the ignorance behind the anti-Brian campaign that he agreed to appear with Cleese on the BBC2 chat show, Friday Night, Saturday Morning to debate the film and the backlash with Mervyn Stockwood, the Bishop of Southwark, and Malcolm Muggeridge, a once rakish journalist who had converted to Christianity after meeting Mother Teresa.

Owen Harris recreated the encounter in the BBC teleplay, Holy Flying Circus (2011), complete with Palin's celebrated put down: '"Yes, I know you started with an open mind; I realise that.' But it later emerged that Muggeridge and Stockwood had missed the first 15 minutes of their special screening and had failed to realise that Brian and Christ were two different people co-existing in the same city. As Cleese later admitted he had been 'astonished, first of all, at how stupid they were, and how boring the debate became'. Nevertheless, it was spoofed by Not the Nine O'Clock News (1979-82), in a sketch in which Mel Smith's Church of Python spokesman takes exception to a film about John Cleese that had been made by Rowan Atkinson's non-believing bishop.

The actual Cleese joined forces with Chapman to create a radio advert in which Peggy Godby played 102 year-old Muriel Cleese begging people to see the film so that her son could afford her retirement home fees. He later opined that the scene involving the gourd and the sandal summed up 'the entire history of religion in two and a half minutes'. Regarding the crucifixion sequence, he claimed, 'Four hundred years ago, we'd have been burnt for this.'

Yet Cleese has continued to insist that the film respected Christ. 'It may sound surprising,' he said, 'but I think Brian is a religious film. I think all the messages in it, in fact, are profoundly religious. It simply depends on what you mean by religious.' As Eric Idle noted, 'Nothing so divides man as belief in the same God.' Although they had been raised as Christians, none of the Pythons had retained his faith. But even they couldn't agree on whether Life of Brian was blasphemous or heretical.

They were united, however, in their critique of factionalism within Middle Eastern politics. Palin revealed that the People's Front of Judea and 'splitter' organisations like the Judean People's Front, the Judean Popular People's Front, and the Campaign For a Free Galilee were modelled on 'modern resistance groups, all with obscure acronyms which they can never remember and their conflicting agendas'. Brian's message to the throng convinced he's the Messiah - 'you don't need to follow anybody! You've got to think for yourselves.' - applies equally to the freedom fighters. Given the furore that arose over the rivals faiths, it's a miracle there weren't bigger political reverberations.

The film struck a chord back in Blighty, however, especially after sailors aboard the stricken HMS Sheffield were recorded singing 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' during the 1982 Falklands War. The song became a funeral favourite and reached No.3 in the UK charts in 1991. Jack Nicholson even sang it en route to winning the Oscar for Best Actor in James L. Brooks's As Good As It Gets (1997) before Eric Idle got to sing it at the Closing Ceremony of the London Olympics (a performance that can be found on London 2012 Olympic Games ).

The song was also dusted down for Idle's stage musical, Spamalot (2005), and his follow-up oratorio, Not the Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy) . The latter was filmed in 2009 and is available to rent from Cinema Paradiso. As is Monty Python's Meaning of Life, which features such religious lampoons as the sycophantic prayer delivered by Palin's school chaplain ('Oh Lord, ooh, you are so big. So absolutely huge. Gosh, we're really impressed down here, I can tell you.') and the production number, 'Every Sperm Is Sacred', which ridicules Catholic attitudes towards birth control.

The ban on Life of Brian would continue in some parts of Britain for decades. Torbay lifted its prohibition in 2008, while Aberystwyth buckled the following year, when Palin and Jones joined Mayor Sue Jones-Davies (who had played Judith) at a special screening. But Eric Idle had it right, when he learned in 1997 that some councils had relaxed their stance to raise funds for Comic Relief and grumbled, 'Is nothing sacred?'