The creators of Big Deal on Madonna Street reteamed for this deliriously absurd send-up of the medieval Crusades genre, an Italian Monty Python and the Holy Grail whose ribald put-downs of all things “honorable” turned the film into one of Italy's biggest hits. Vittorio Gassman is a blowhard knight with a mind as warped as his grasp of language (the film's fantastical Italian-by-way-of-Latin-and-then-through-the-gutter dialogues would be the bane of any translator); hooking up with three not-so-wise men, he soon blazes a torrid path through medieval Italy, encountering plagues, damsels in distress (including a whip-wielding Barbara Steele), not-so-saintly holy men, and evil lords. Legendary writing duo Age and Scarpelli provide the film's satiric script, while Oscar-winning set and costume designer Piero Gherardi outdoes even Gassman's hammy performance with his Byzantine creations.