The Secret Policeman’s Balls (Shout! Factory DVD Set)
Picture: C
Sound: C+ Extras: B- Films: B
Amnesty International is a good organization that has been
monitoring human rights abuses, especially where political prisoners are
involved. This takes many to join in and
also to contribute financially somehow as there has to be funding to keep
anything afloat. Back in 1976, a fund raising special called Pleasure At Her Majesty’s inadvertently
launched a series of fundraising concert events that led to feature film
releases. With five to date, Shout!
Factory has collected them all in the new DVD collection The Secret Policeman’s Balls.
Beginning
with that first show, the tone was set with great comedy and comedy casts, plus
music guests. As these shows became more
successful, the music was upped and eventually overtook them until John Cleese
directed the most recent one, bringing it back to its comedy roots. The films are:
Pleasure At Her Majesty’s (1976)
The Secret Policeman’s Ball (1979)
The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball (1981)
The Secret Policeman’s Third Ball (1987)
The Secret Policeman’s Biggest Ball (1989)
Many
Monty Python members, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore show up for the initial film,
all but Moore return for the second film and are joined by Rowan Atkinson,
Eleanor Bron, an in amazing form Pete Townshend and the guitarist John Williams
doing his unforgettable theme to The
Deer Hunter. The third film received
the greatest distribution in the U.S. and has Sting, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton,
Bob Geldof and even Phil Collins joining Cleese, Atkinson and Palin. The fourth features Geldof joined by the
comedy team of Stephen Fry & Hugh (House,
M.D.) Laurie plus an amazing line-up of musicians including Kate bush,
David Gilmour, Joan Armatrading, Nik Kershaw, Jackson Browne, Paul Brady, Mark Knopfler, Chet Atkins, Lou
Reed, Duran Duran, Ben Elton, Youssou N’Dour and Peter Gabriel.
The all
comedy recent (1989) show includes Cleese, Fry & Laurie, the return of Cook & Moore,
Robbie Coltrane, Adrian Edmondson, Lenny Henry and the team of Dawn French and
Jennifer Saunders before Absolutely Fabulous hit. These lists are by no means complete, but it
gives you the idea of how rich in talent these shows are and why they are all
must-sees. Add the extras and this is a
terrific set, especially for such a good and vital cause.
The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on the later
shows are about on par with the 1.33 X 1 image on the original and analog
videotaped 1989 show, which is not as good as it could be and the last time
Amnesty is going to be able to use these transfers before they need High
Definition versions, save the ‘89 show. The
Dolby Digital sound on all the films is increasingly better, but only slightly
and also need some work. They are
monophonic, then become stereo. The
combination is watchable, but not always optimal. Extras include a “Top Secret” file with text
and images on the series, optional intros by co-creator Martin Lewis made for
this set, a documentary on the films entitled Remember The Secret
Policeman’s Ball?,
long unavailable sequence from the U.S. releases, rare performances not in the
theatrical cuts, rare promotional TV spots, trailers and news footage.
- Nicholas Sheffo
