Stream Online Monty Python and the Holy Grail Free on Its 50th Anniversary

This year, YouTube cel­e­brat­ed its twen­ti­eth anniver­sary, prompt­ing younger users to won­der what life could have been like before it. The fifti­eth anniver­sary of Mon­ty Python and the Holy Grail, which pre­miered in April of 1975, has inspired sim­i­lar reflec­tion among com­e­dy enthu­si­asts. It can be dif­fi­cult, at this point, to imag­ine one­self back in a cul­ture not yet dis­rupt­ed by Mon­ty Python’s rig­or­ous­ly absurd log­ic, scat­ter­shot satire, and delib­er­ate break­ing of nar­ra­tive and social con­ven­tion — a cul­ture, indeed, where that sort of thing could be feared too dan­ger­ous for tele­vi­sion and film.

It was their BBC sketch series Mon­ty Python’s Fly­ing Cir­cus that intro­duced this comedic sen­si­bil­i­ty first to Britain, and then to the world. Between that show’s third and fourth sea­sons, the Pythons — Gra­ham Chap­man, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Ter­ry Jones, Michael Palin, and Ter­ry Gilliam — took on the side project of cre­at­ing their own cin­e­mat­ic re-inter­pre­ta­tion of Arthuri­an leg­end.

With a mod­est bud­get fur­nished by Led Zep­pelin, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tul­l’s Ian Ander­son, and oth­er investors con­nect­ed to the music world, they plunged them­selves into a grimy, unglam­orous vision of the Mid­dle Ages, punc­tu­at­ed by inex­plic­a­ble anachro­nism and sat­u­rat­ed with an icon­o­clas­tic dis­re­gard for received wis­dom and trumped-up glo­ry.

There the Pythons told a sto­ry that, while per­haps lack­ing in nar­ra­tive struc­ture — to say noth­ing of his­tor­i­cal real­ism — more than com­pen­sates in sheer com­ic momen­tum. By all accounts, it holds up half a cen­tu­ry on, even for those view­ers who’ve already seen it so many times as to have invol­un­tar­i­ly com­mit­ted every joke to mem­o­ry. In cel­e­bra­tion of its anniver­sary, the film has become avail­able to stream free (albeit not in all regions of the world) on the offi­cial YouTube Movies & TV chan­nel, where the lat­est gen­er­a­tions of Mon­ty Python fans first dis­cov­ered their work. Even if lines like “I fart in your gen­er­al direc­tion” no longer raise any trans­gres­sive fris­son, there’s still lit­tle on that plat­for­m’s uni­verse of con­tent to match Mon­ty Python and the Holy Grail’s mul­ti­lay­ered silli­ness, whose place in the annals of com­e­dy leg­end has long since been assured.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Ter­ry Gilliam’s Lost Ani­ma­tions from Mon­ty Python and the Holy Grail Are Now Online

Mon­ty Python’s Eric Idle Breaks Down His Most Icon­ic Char­ac­ters

Mon­ty Python and the Holy Grail Cen­sor­ship Let­ter: We Want to Retain “Fart in Your Gen­er­al Direc­tion”

Mon­ty Python and the Holy Grail Re-Imag­ined as an Epic, Main­stream Hol­ly­wood Film

Mon­ty Python’s Best Phi­los­o­phy Sketch­es

Based in Seoul, Col­in Marshall writes and broad­casts on cities, lan­guage, and cul­ture. His projects include the Sub­stack newslet­ter Books on Cities and the book The State­less City: a Walk through 21st-Cen­tu­ry Los Ange­les. Fol­low him on the social net­work for­mer­ly known as Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.