61 Monty Python's The Life of Brian

[MTRodaba2468]

Is the new Brian only in HD or BluRay or whatever?

Yes, I have 20th century technology and haven't bought a new tv and new dvd player yet.

Re-releases like Brian and Baron Mucnhausen will force me to, yes?

Hum... Must be a new drive I can buy for the computer that can play BluRay. Or the old drive with new software?

Both rereleases are available on standard DVD as well as Blu-Ray.

[PfR73]

I just recently purchased the Criterion edition of Life of Brian. My disc stutters at about the 01:01:05 mark as Charles McKeown is saying "The master has healed me. I was blind & now I can see." I have already done an exchange at the store because the first unit I purchased was doing this & I thought it was defective, but the replacement unit is doing it also.

Does anyone else have this problem? I wanted to check before emailing Jon Mulvaney about it.

[domino harvey]

It's probably just the layer switch

[PfR73]

Does anyone know where the layer switch is on this particular disc? It seems an odd place for it to be & my player is not reacting the way it normally does when it's a layer switch. It is not pasuing, the picture & audio are almost going back & forth several times very quickly.

[Antoine Doinel]

No longer banned in Aberystwyth.

[Orlac]

I just recently purchased the Criterion edition of Life of Brian. My disc stutters at about the 01:01:05 mark as Charles McKeown is saying "The master has healed me. I was blind & now I can see." I have already done an exchange at the store because the first unit I purchased was doing this & I thought it was defective, but the replacement unit is doing it also.

Does anyone else have this problem? I wanted to check before emailing Jon Mulvaney about it.

Mine does the same. Got a replacement and same thing again.

[Roger Ryan]

Actually, Sony's IMMACULATE EDITION issue of this film has a significantly better transfer than the older Criterion version and carries over almost all of the Criterion extras while adding a couple of substantial new ones. It's available on Blu-ray as well.

I've held on to the Criterion version for the 1979 BBC doc THE PYTHONS which is not included in the Sony package, but the Sony issue trumps Criterion in all other regards.

[neal]

I just recently purchased the Criterion edition of Life of Brian. My disc stutters at about the 01:01:05 mark as Charles McKeown is saying "The master has healed me. I was blind & now I can see." I have already done an exchange at the store because the first unit I purchased was doing this & I thought it was defective, but the replacement unit is doing it also.

Does anyone else have this problem? I wanted to check before emailing Jon Mulvaney about it.

Mine does the same. Got a replacement and same thing again.

He says, four years and eight months later...

[colinr0380]

I have just gotten to the recent Columbia DVD of Life of Brian and going through the "15th July 1977" read-through of the script of Life of Brian by the Pythons that they used as a guideline to refer back to while making the film. It is a great extra (illustrated with pans over script pages and occasional storyboards) particularly for showing that while the basic structure and most of the biggest jokes are present, there are still some problems with the characters and structure of the film at this point which get solved in the much more streamlined final film.

The character of Judith in particular seems not to be too thought through at the point of the script reading. Is she related to Brian or a good friend (suggested by being present at the opening sermon on the mount with Brian and his mother), or the actual love interest that she became in the film (suggested by her reaction as Brian is being taken to be crucified?). The final film smooths all of this confusion down so that Judith becomes a major character in the drama and the link between Brian and the Judean People's Front, as his infatuation with her drags him into trouble! Without Judith providing that 'motivation' the political activist group also plays in an unfocused manner as well, with Brian having actively politically chosen to ally himself with them. Also, if Judith is meant to be the love interest, it is strange that her main scene in the finished film (the one where she defends Brian naked in front of his mum) does not feature her in this script reading. Instead that scene features Brian enjoying his new messiah status with a couple of never seen again floozies!

This all feeds into the biggest problem apparent in that 1977 script reading, and which the final film perfectly fixes: the character of Brian himself. Brian in the film is guileless, and consequently more lovable, throughout - he is eager to learn but cowardly and unable to assert himself in the face of the more abusive characters (from his mum, to the Judean People's Front, to the Roman guard schooling him in Latin, to eventually his adoring followers! Amusingly the one person he stands up to is Pilate himself, mostly because he mishears Pilate due to Pilate's lisp!) There's also the sense throughout that Brian just wants to be left alone throughout the film, with is ironically inverted when he's up on the cross begging for help and getting none!

The Brian in the 1977 script reading is much more assertive from telling his mother that he is definitely going to his political meeting, to defiantly throwing his tray of food that he sells at his colosseum job to the ground before going to paint slogans on walls, to actually quite enjoying his new messiah status (which grates badly against the scenes where he is trying to explain that his 'miracles' are not miracles to his new followers!) and giving sermons on the mount, as well as making pompous and self aggrandising statements in response to questions from the crowd from his bedroom window (rather than desperately trying to explain the situation to them, which only strengthens their belief in him, as in the final film!), and taking advantage of his status to bed a couple of 'groupies'!

Basically Brian in that '77 script reading is an unsympathetic arse, whereas the Brian in the final film is a tragic victim of other people's assumptions and all the better for it.

[Pavel]

Possibly a stupid question, and of course it's not the middle of the month yet, but does anybody know how long this has had 9 stills?

[DeprongMori]

The Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine shows the Life of Brian page without stills, captured in 2017

[Blutarsky]

Went back to my old college town this past weekend and found they had a collection of sealed out of print/currently unavailable criterion DVDs. Picked up Bad Timing and this one. I am genuinely curious if Criterion has any plans on rereleasing this title since they have reacquired the HandMade films catalogue, and there have been stills on the website since 2020 (or before). I imagine it is somewhere in the pipeline.

[yoloswegmaster]

Life of Brian (as well as the Holy Grail) are with Sony, so it's up to them if they want to release it themselves or license it to a third party.

[colinr0380]

I would like to hope that they would try and do The Meaning of Life as well (maybe throw in And Now For Something Completely Different and the Live at the Hollywood Bowl features too) in order to create a definitive UHD Python film box.

[swo17]

Meaning of Life just got a UHD release

[Blutarsky]

Meaning of Life just got a UHD release

And a pretty damn good 4K release if I say so myself.

(maybe throw in And Now For Something Completely Different and the Live at the Hollywood Bowl features too)

If Criterion were to rerelease (thank you yoloswegmaster for clarifying the rights situation) Life of Brian, I do recall seeing a print of Live at the Hollywood Bowl that had a HandMade films logo, so I wonder if it is with Sony. And Now For Something Completely Different was produced by Playboy films, so I have no idea who might own the rights of that now (possibly playboy still?)

[beamish14]

Meaning of Life just got a UHD release

And a pretty damn good 4K release if I say so myself.

(maybe throw in And Now For Something Completely Different and the Live at the Hollywood Bowl features too)

If Criterion were to rerelease (thank you yoloswegmaster for clarifying the rights situation) Life of Brian, I do recall seeing a print of Live at the Hollywood Bowl that had a HandMade films logo, so I wonder if it is with Sony. And Now For Something Completely Different was produced by Playboy films, so I have no idea who might own the rights of that now (possibly playboy still?)

And Now for Something… is Sony, like Playboy’s Macbeth. Saw a beautiful print of it from them a few years ago

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Live at the Hollywood Bowl is also with Sony. There's an HD master out there (not sure if it's the one on Netflix, which is streaming the film at least in the U.S.) but it's never going to look too hot, since the live performance parts were shot on 655-line video. I do wonder if it would be possible to do a transfer from the original video materials—I'm pretty sure the HD version is from 35mm.

[Farley Flavors]

Live at the Hollywood Bowl is also with Sony. There's an HD master out there (not sure if it's the one on Netflix, which is streaming the film at least in the U.S.) but it's never going to look too hot, since the live performance parts were shot on 655-line video. I do wonder if it would be possible to do a transfer from the original video materials—I'm pretty sure the HD version is from 35mm.

Apparently the original video tapes do still exist, but they're on such an obscure and long obsolete format that it's no longer possible to scan them (or it would at least be prohibitely expensive).