Satire In Monty Python And The Holy Grail

Satire Within Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The film Monty Python and the Holy Grail tells the story of King Arthur of Camelot who gathers his knights of the Round Table and leads them on a quest to find the Holy Grail. The knights eventually find the castle that houses the Holy Grail, but once there, they are stopped by French soldiers and the police. In the scene “Witch Village,” a mob of villagers has captured a woman and has dressed her up like a witch. The villagers are convinced that she is a witch despite a lack of evidence and insist on burning her. The scene “The Rescue of Prince Herbert” tells the story of how Sir Lancelot receives an anonymous distress call, and believing it to be from a damsel in distress, he storms the castle …show more content…
While traveling through the forest, Sir Lancelot receives a message in which the sender asks for help escaping the castle. Assuming that the sender is a beautiful woman in need, Sir Lancelot storms the castle and kills all of the guards, only to find that the one in need of rescuing is the young Prince Herbert. The king confronts Lancelot and says, “You killed eight wedding guests in all.” In his defence, Sir Lancelot states, “Well the thing is, I thought your son was a lady.” Sir Lancelot’s excessive use of force while trying to rescue the sender of the message mocks the stereotypical role of men as violent and thoughtless. His extremely violent approach to the task ridicules the portrayal of men as irrational and brutish. The fact that Sir Lancelot believes that his murderous actions were justified because he was trying to save a woman mocks the stereotypical protector-victim relationship present in a majority of medieval writing. He is prepared to do for a woman what he wouldn’t do for a man because he sees women as helpless and in greater need than a man. Lancelot unexpectedly abandons his attempt to rescue the sender when he realizes the sender is male. This unexpected event reveals to the audience the scorning of the traditional idea that all women are helpless and all men are strong in that it points out the ridiculousness of Lancelot’s actions based on said idea. Lancelot’s admits that he wouldn’t have stormed the castle and killed the guests if he knew the sender was a man, which is unexpected honesty due to its sexism and because Prince Herbert was still present in the room. Lancelot’s surprisingly honest comment draws attention to the absurdity of Lancelot’s views, thus making it clear to the audience that gender roles are being ridiculed. Gender roles are a relevant target for satire because even