Twenty years after its initial release, Monty Python's final film The Meaning of Life remains their most fragmented, and ultimately their least satisfying film. Having said that, it still definitely has some fun moments and there's far worse ways that you could spend two hours.

"And it went...wherever I...did go"

The movie opens with Terry Gilliam's twenty minute short film The Crimson Permanent Assurance Company, and it's one of the film's highlights. This bizarre bit involves a group of elderly insurance adjusters who suddenly transform into a mob of authentic pirates who "sail the high seas of global finance." While great fun, this opening is clearly the work of Gilliam alone as writer and director, and features none of the other members of Python save a brief cameo by Michael Palin. As a result it doesn't feel much like a Monty Python effort, and is rather out of place compared to the rest of the film.

After this introduction we move into "the feature presentation." The Meaning of Life is really more like Python's early days in sketch comedy than a cohesive film like their previous effort, The Life of Brian. It consists of several extended vignettes tied together with the concept of offering-say it with me now!-the meaning of life. When they hit their mark (the infamous Mr. Creosote, the over-the-top musical number Every Sperm is Sacred) it's great stuff. But too often they miss, and some sections become dull. Lord knows a comedy is better off being outright terrible than being simply boring.

As with the recent re-release of The Holy Grail, this two-disc DVD set is a model of what a "special edition" should be. Most illuminating is the feature commentary from "The Terrys"-Jones and Gilliam, who reveal what the finished product shows: by this time the six members of Monty Python weren't hanging out together too much, and they found it difficult to recreate the kindred spirits that permeated their earlier work. Also included are documentaries, outtakes, and new footage from the five "living" Pythons-although Eric Idle is looking only slightly less dead than the late Graham Chapman.

Life's a bitch.

As for smut factor… The bedrock of the smut in this movie comes when Graham Chapman is allowed to choose his own way to die-and chooses to be chased off a cliff by a team of under-clad female runners. The sight of 15+ near-nude women jogging in slow motion, bouncing appropriately, is the stuff that dreams are made of. Ironic that Chapman was the openly gay member of the troupe… Other than that, this film features Magenta from The Rocky Horror Picture Show getting naked and fucking John Cleese in front of a classroom of schoolboys. Terry Jones and Eric Idle also spend a lot of time in drag. In true Python fashion, it's all more goofy than smutty. Still, those joggers…

So, to sum up… If you're new to the Monty Python world you would be better off renting their masterpiece The Life of Brian, or any shows from the first two seasons of Flying Circus. For the serious Python fan, this is a huge improvement over the now out-of-print first DVD release of The Meaning of Life, which featured virtually nothing in the way of extras. Regardless, this film should be enjoyed with a wafer-thin after-dinner mint.

(Click Here for DVD's Technical Specs)

BRYN