Monty Python and the Holy Grail
1975 film directed by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones
Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a 1975 British comedy film based on the Arthurian legend, written and performed by the Monty Python comedy group (Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin) and directed by Gilliam and Jones in their feature directorial debuts. It was conceived during the hiatus between the third and fourth series of their BBC Television series Monty Python's Flying Circus.
While the group's first film, And Now for Something Completely Different, was a compilation of sketches from the first two television series, Holy Grail is an original story that parodies the legend of King Arthur's quest for the Holy Grail. Thirty years later, Idle used the film as the basis for the 2005 Tony Award–winning musical Spamalot.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail grossed more than any other British film screened in the US in 1975, and has since been considered one of the greatest comedy films of all time. In the US, it was selected in 2011 as the second-best comedy of all time in the ABC special Best in Film: The Greatest Movies of Our Time behind Airplane!. In the UK, readers of Total Film magazine in 2000 ranked it the fifth-greatest comedy film of all time; a similar poll of Channel 4 viewers in 2006 placed it sixth.
Plot
In AD 932, King Arthur and his squire Patsy, who bangs coconut shells together as Arthur mimes riding a horse, travel Britain searching for men to join the Knights of the Round Table. Along the way, Arthur debates whether coconuts could be found in a temperate climate, passes through a town infected with a plague, recounts receiving Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake to two anarcho-syndicalist peasants, and defeats the Black Knight. At an impromptu witch trial, he recruits Sir Bedevere the Wise, later joined by Sir Lancelot the Brave, Sir Galahad the Pure, Sir Robin the Not-Quite-So-Brave-as-Sir-Lancelot, and the aptly named Sir Not-Appearing-in-this-Film, along with their squires and Robin's minstrels.
The public source identifies “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” as 1975 film directed by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Monty, Python and Holy.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”, the useful work is to connect “1975 film directed by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q25043. VIAF identifies the subject as 316751991. The Library of Congress control number is no2004089990. 7 of 9 selected statements include explicit references; 6 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1975, 2005, 2011 and 2000.
Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.
- Identifying works and editions
- Tracing reception history
- Finding collection records
The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Monty Python and the Holy Grail primary sources, Monty Python and the Holy Grail archive and Monty research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”?
- How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
- Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.