The Golden Age of Ballooning
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The Golden Age of Ballooning |
| Country of production | Great Britain |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1974 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Ian MacNaughton |
| script | Monty Python |
| production | Ian MacNaughton |
| music |
John Philip Sousa Neil Innes |
| camera | James Purdie |
| cut | Robert C. Dearberg |
| occupation | |
| |
The Golden Age of Ballooning (German: "The Golden Age of Ballooning") is an episode of the English comedy series Monty Python's Flying Circus . The episode was the first of the fourth season and first aired on October 31, 1974. It was also the first episode without John Cleese , who had previously dropped out of the series.
In the sketches of the episode, which is made up as a BBC documentary, historical aviation pioneers such as the Montgolfier brothers or Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin and other personalities appear in order to perform grotesque gags from the historical context.
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The Beginnings
While working on a toilet, a plumber ( Michael Palin ) explains that the eponymous “Golden Age of Ballooning” began in 1783 with the experiments of the Montgolfier brothers . Then the brothers themselves appear: Jacques ( Eric Idle ) and Joseph ( Terry Jones ) stand at the window of their property in Annonay and are full of hope, with the balloon ascent “ just after Montesquieu and just before Mozart ” (German: “directly to Montesquieu and shortly before Mozart ”) to go down in the history books. When Jacques announces that he wants to wash himself, the conversation takes an absurd turn in which Joseph finally complains that he has not washed himself adequately and that he is the less clean of the Montgolfiér brothers. They are interrupted by their butler O'Toole ( Graham Chapman ), who announces a visitor named Bartlett, but always pronounces the name incorrectly (“ Parfitt… Barklit… Barkit ”) and is then corrected by Bartlett, who briefly looks in the door. But when he finally succeeds, Joseph rejects the visitor. This is followed by an animated film sequence in which, in addition to an animation of two men fighting a boxing match in a washing trough, details about the brothers' washing process are given.
Then grotesque merchandise articles for documentation such as For example, a frog croaking the words "The Golden Age of Ballooning" was advertised and a fine or imprisonment was threatened if it was not acquired.
The Montgolfier Brothers in Love
In his study, Antoinette ( Carol Cleveland ), Joseph's lover, complains about his enthusiasm for aviation, which is already extreme. Even when asked whether it means nothing to him, he evasively replies that he prefers it to any aircraft heavier than air. Jacques bursts into the advances and announces that King Louis XIV will be a guest that evening . Mentioning the name already leads to skepticism, as the king has actually been dead for years.
When O'Toole announced the visit, Mr. Bartlett tried again to gain access, but was again refused. When Jacques and Louis meet, there is an embarrassed silence; Louis is difficult to understand when spoken to about his arrival from Paris and speaks with a strong Scottish accent. The butler, who is relatively disoriented and unable to serve the apparently prominent guest Clairet, creates further excitement . Suddenly appearing and only clad in a bathing cap and towel, Joseph unmasked Louis as a fraudster by holding the year of his death (1715) in front of him, whereupon the fraudster only identified himself as Louis XV. († 1774) and then finally as Louis XVI. and with the reference to being occupied as king with more important things than the correct counting of his name, Joseph incapacitates with a headbutt. While Jacques is still busy with O'Toole, Louis and his entourage steal the plans for the hot air balloon and flee through the window into the park. This part ends with a renewed transition.
The Great Day for France
In the middle of a political discussion program in which “Sir Dividends” (Chapman) and “Lord Interest” (Idle) talk about an economic crisis, the show's host (Palin) announces the next episode in the series.
At the court of the English King George III. (Chapman), who has just got a children's story read out by a servant (Idle), the impostor quits under the name Louis XVIII. but is refused again because of the wrong name and uses force to gain access to the throne room, where he first confuses the reader with the king, then addresses the latter as George IV and pretends to have miscounted on the long journey from Paris . The fraudster's plan also becomes apparent: He would like the balloon plans to be sent to George III. sell, this requires in return that the French troops must be withdrawn from North America. Again, surprisingly and as before with the saying “ Just a moment! "Joseph Montgolfier in bathing suits and calls Louis again as a cheater. However, Louis strikes the inventor down again. The vocal trio " The Ronettes " then entered the hall and sang a hymn composed by Neil Innes to George III, whereupon the latter complained that he should not go crazy before 1800.
The sketch then continues on the Montgolfier estate, where Antoinette and Jacques stayed. While Antoinette worries about Joseph, who has been absent for six months, and the balloon plans, Jacques tries in vain to persuade Antoinette to kiss her with tongue . O'Toole is still looking for the Clairet, his announcement that Mr. Bartlett has left because he could not wait any longer is suddenly celebrated with frenetic applause from a previously unseen audience, with bows and a repetition of the scene is acknowledged. Then numerous people and the other actors enter the scene to congratulate O'Toole with flowers and congratulations, the credits are already shown.
Party Political Broadcast on behalf of the Norwegian Party
Another advertisement for promotional items is followed by a speech in fictional Norwegian by a Norwegian politician (Idle) in which he first praises the country's economic development and then the advantages of Norwegian women. A discussion is then announced to which people who have only rudimentary anything to do with Norway will be invited, such as Mr. Brian Waynor, whose surname is an anagram of “Norway”, or the Ford couple, whose name is very reminiscent of the in Norway is reminiscent of widespread fjords .
Ferdinand von Zeppelin: Pioneer of the Airship
The part, announced as the sixth part of the series, initially reports in a family portrait that Ferdinand von Zeppelin is the brother of Barry Zeppelin (Jones), the least gifted of the fourteen Zeppelin brothers. In the following silent film sequence he inflates balloons that are getting bigger and bigger, but all of them fall to the ground. At the last balloon, the air escapes from it and instead inflates Barry, who then rises into the air as a balloon.
In the following it is reported that the year 1908 brought the decisive breakthrough for Ferdinand von Zeppelin. Numerous celebrities are gathered in the gondola of an airship to the sounds of a string quartet. Chancellor von Bülow (Palin) was the first to approach von Zeppelin (Chapman) and noticed that the zeppelin was bringing ballooning back into fashion (“ This puts ballooning right back on the map! ”). Von Zeppelin reacts indignantly and emphasizes loudly that his aircraft is not a balloon, but an airship. Next, Alfred von Tirpitz (Jones) asks how “this balloon” works. Once again, von Zeppelin reacted angrily and came across von Tirpitz with the words “ If you want to play with balloons, get outside! ”From the door of the airship. It is cut to the living room of an old couple, whose wife (Jones) is busy knitting, while the man (Palin), called Helmut, sits in an armchair in underpants and reads from a culinary dictionary. The whole house is broken into a crash.
Then State Secretary Hollweg (Idle) approaches the inventor and inquires about the rumor that von Zeppelin should name a balloon after Bismarck . After Zeppelin angrily brings up that the aircraft is a zeppelin and has nothing to do with Bismarck, he also pushes Hollweg out the door, which is reflected again in Helmut and his wife's house. Bülow, who asks about Hollweg, is also thrown out, and in a subsequent trick sequence it becomes clear that this fate will happen to a few other people.
Then the scene pans completely to Helmut's house. In some strange dialogues, the two discover the corpses lying in their salon and that they practically represent the entire government of the German Reich. They feel honored by this and decide to sort the corpses according to work area. At the end, the far-reaching consequences of the event are explained from the off: The wallet of one of the falling ministers had seriously injured a young woman in Nijmegen , who then married the doctor in charge. The couple, in turn, represent the grandparents of Mike Henderson, the producer of "The Golden Age of Ballooning". The people mentioned are represented in ancient nude photographs.
During the final credits, the title "The Golden Age of Ballooning" is initially replaced by "The Golden Age of Colonic Irrigation" (German: "The Golden Age of the Colon - Enema "), then the list of names from the "Norwegian Party" -Sketch continued. Finally, the title “The Mill on the Floss, Part I: Ballooning” is faded in to the picture of a couple from the Victorian era (German: “ The Mill on the Floss , Part I: Ballooning”).
Historical notes
Although "The Golden Age of Ballooning" is a satire, individual historical contexts are correctly reproduced:
- The year and place of birth of Ferdinand von Zeppelin are shown correctly.
- The year 1908 was indeed to be seen as a success for von Zeppelin, the voyages of the airship LZ 3 prompted Kaiser Wilhelm II to describe von Zeppelin as the “greatest German of the 20th century”.
- Likewise, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg was actually State Secretary for the Interior in 1908, and Bernhard von Bülow held the office of Reich Chancellor.
However, other aspects are falsified:
- The Montgolfier brothers' first balloon ascent did not take place on June 7, 1783, but on June 4, albeit unmanned.
- The State Secretary of the Reich Colonial Office was not, as Ms. Helmut claims, subordinate to the Ministry of the Interior, but worked independently and was previously subordinate to the Foreign Office . It is possible, however, that the assertion that colonial administration falls under domestic policy is an allusion to imperialism .
Web links
- The Golden Age of Ballooning in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Golden Age of Ballooning in the All Movie Guide (English)
- Scripts (English):