Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

A hodgepodge of sketch comedies on the series of life transitions from birth to death, Monty Python's The Meaning of Life was the final Monty Python film and the last time John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Palin, Graham Chapman, Terry Gilliam, and Terry Jones all worked together.

Fast Facts

1. Release Date: March 31, 1983
2. Director: Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam
3. Screenwriter(s): Monty Python
4. Producer: John Goldstone
5. Distributor: Universal Pictures
6. MPAA Rating: R
7. Run time: 107 minutes
8. Original Title: Monty Python's Fish Film
9. Awards: Grand Prize of the Jury at the Cannes Film Festival
10. The song Every Sperm is Sacred was nominated for a BAFTA Award
11. Most of the children in the Every Sperm is Sacred sketch did not know what they were singing about

Plot Summary

1. Birth
2. Growth and Learning
3. Fighting Each Other
4. Middle Age
5. Live Organ Transplants
6. The Autumn Years
7. Death.

Although this is a sketch film, the stories are held together by six fish who lead the viewer on a journey through the life cycle of man. Also making the film cohesive is Monty Python's stated theme of offending "absolutely everyone."

Meaning of Life Quotes

1. "It's a Mr. Death, dear. He's here about the reaping."
2. "Don't stand there gawping! Like you've never seen the hand o' God before!"
3. "Arthur Charles Herbert Runcie MacAdam Jarrett, you have been convicted by twelve good persons and true… of the crime of first-degree making of gratuitous, sexist jokes in a moving picture."
4. "Hello, and welcome to 'The Middle of the Film', the moment where we take a break to invite you, the audience, to join us, the film-makers, in 'Find the Fish'. We're going to show you a scene from another film and ask you to guess where the fish is, but, if you think you know, don't keep it to yourselves. Yell out so that all the cinema can hear you."
5. Grim Reaper: "I am Death!" Guest #4: "Well, that's cast a gloom over the evening..."

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