The Great McGonagall

This film is totally hilarious. The film is a loose adaptation of the life of William "Topaz" Mcgonagall, said to be the worst poet circa 1890. Milligan is excellent, playing the role with great determination. Spinetti is hilarious in at least 5 different roles. McGrath uses guerrilla filming tactics in his direction, sort of similar to his earlier film "The Magic Christian" also with Sellers, and Milligan. Peter Sellers pulls a sort of "Mouse that Roared" revival, this time playing the role of Queen Victoria. The VHS copy that I own is at least 25 years old. Hopefully Anchor Bay, Crtierion, or some other company will take note of the value of this film, and give it the release that it deserves.

Firstly I ought to say that apart from me its hard to see who this film will appeal to. To really enjoy it i think that you have to love the real poet Mcgonagall (otherwise you will miss the hilarious fact that all the poetry read in the film is quite real and written seriously) and have to appreciate the very surreal pythonesque humor (such as Prince Albert being dressed as Hitler from the waist up). If your one of the dozen people who fit into both of these categories you will adore the film as I did. However I must say that the best part of it was just listening to Spike Milligan (and Queen Victoria!) reading Mcgonagall's poetry. Surprisingly given the absolute madness of the film the ending is actually very touching.

Spike Milligan never got an even break. After he redefined comedy and pop culture on the radio with his scripts and performances on "The Goon Show," driving himself in the process to a nervous breakdown, he had to watch while his flabby "Goon Show" partner Peter Sellers became a film comedy superstar. By the time Milligan was well enough to try his own hand at film acting, it was already the 1970s and he had become passe.

His biggest stab at cinematic glory, "The Great McGonagall," reveals he might have gotten out of the looney bin a little too early. Portraying a talentless Scottish poet, Milligan overacts his way through a punchy script he co-wrote with director Joseph McGrath. Sellers appears too, as Queen Victoria, and ironically the two former Goons - who used to play dozens of roles apiece each week on the radio - stick to single characters while other actors, including Victor Spinetti of "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help!," are given the task of performing multiple parts.

It's a strange film that breaks down in the second half, much the way Milligan must have in real life. Still, the script offers hints of the great Goonish humor that launched a comedy revolution.

"Knock, knock." Who says that? "A wee postman who canna reach the knocker," is the reply.

There's strange bits of self-indulgence, too. Scenes are broken up by actors shoving pies in each other's faces, and at one point Milligan forgets his line, whereupon the cameras continue to run as the director and other actors coach him on what to say. It's very bizarre, and might even be fascinating, but for the fact that the story on screen is too slender to brook such diversions.

Sellers, the one name actor in this film, is given little to do as Queen Victoria but perform reaction shots, and occasional witty lines like "Does anyone know a good solicitor" when her Prince Albert locks lips with a male messenger. The early 1970s were a dry period for Sellers, and "The Great McGonagall" was no exception. Albert wears a kilt but otherwise dresses like Hitler, a tiny joke which Milligan and the filmmakers beat into the ground. Valentine Dyall, a dead ringer for Ian McKellen, comes off best in a series of roles that include Alfred Lord Tennyson and a Zulu messenger.

"The Great McGonagall" no doubt amused its makers, who thought it would be funny to send up a bad poet endlessly mocked by fate and society, but on screen it's no "Ed Wood" of poesy. Its too disjointed, too mean-spirited. It's the product of a man who has seemingly given up on life, and wants to hit his audience upside the head with its sordid futility. Milligan, a comic genius who never got his due on screen, had reason to be depressed, but you do not. Give this a miss.

This is the film that "Wind From the East" so desperately wanted to be. Deconstructs itself before your very eyes. Hilarious and mystifying. Spike Milligan and Joe McGrath were made for each other. And Peter Sellers is on board too. I find it hard to believe this classic of the Cinema of the Absurd is so little known. But then so is McGrath -- the Edgar G. Ulmer of British comedy. While Richard Lester is more associated with "The Goon Shpw" -- thanks to "The Running Jumping and Standing Still Film," it's McGrath who conveys the true Goonish sense of intellectual lunacy. The fact that the entire film is shot inside of a theater -- used to suggest the whole world -- is especially novel and fascinating.

Interesting in an history of British comedy sense. It has a Goon Show cast does Monty Python skit feel. Unfortunately, it takes a concept that would have been appropriate for a five minute skit and stretches it out an additional hour and a half. A fine supporting performance by Peter Sellers and sporadic gratuitous female nudity (while appreciated) are insufficient to save this from being an albeit quirky and unique but simultaneously mediocre and repetitive low budget comedy.

As an aside, the video copy of this film that I purchased features a full cover picture of Peter Sellers and in the short synopsis on the reverse states that Sellers stars as The Great McGonagall. For the benefit of those of you who have yet to see the film, this is entirely incorrect. Peter Sellers plays the relatively small roll of Queen Victoria and Spike Milligan stars as McGonagall.