A Liar's Autobiography - The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman (2012)
Average Rating: 5/10
Reviews Counted: 45
Fresh: 21 | Rotten: 24
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: 5.4/10
Critic Reviews: 16
Fresh: 7 | Rotten: 9
No consensus yet.
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Average Rating: 3.2/5
User Ratings: 361
Movie Info
Graham Chapman, probably best remembered as 'the dead one from Monty Python', writes and stars in the animated movie of his own life story, A Liar's Autobiography. Although Chapman selfishly dropped dead in 1989, he had taken the trouble to record himself reading his book, A Liar's Autobiography - and those recordings have now ingeniously been used to provide Chapman's voice for the 3D animated feature of the same name. Fellow Pythons John Cleese, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Terry Gilliam
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All Critics (45) | Top Critics (16) | Fresh (21) | Rotten (24)
The varying tones give a patchy feel to the enterprise without adding up to anything as radical as the Pythons' own assault on TV conventions. A cordial tribute to a fascinating chap nonetheless.
Top CriticThe film's mostly for Python completists, of whom there are many, as well as for animation junkies who will groove on the grab bag of styles.
Apart from Chapman's dry observational tone and the others' silly voices, there's not much here to touch Python fans accustomed to soaring in a higher stratosphere of humour.
It's a very naughty tome, with many dangling bits.
It's like watching Yellow Submarine laid over a celebrity-therapy episode of Dr. Phil.
Alternately brilliant and frustrating.
Even at 85 minutes, the movie often drags as if there was insufficient quality material to draw upon.
That the film is a bit of a mess reflects Chapman's life precisely.
Subtitled "The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman", this outrageously colourful animated movie certainly can't be pigeonholed as a documentary or a biopic, even though there are elements of each.
Liar's doesn't give us much insight into the meaning of his life.
Not just for Python fans.
Bafflingly unfunny, and made with a ruinous lack of guiding intelligence.
Fades in the mind all too quickly.
The film is an engaging trip: miscellaneous, wittily surreal, with a sadness to lend it a structuring heartbeat.
A Liar's Autobiography pays a tribute to Graham Chapman, but Monty Python fans will feel a little cheated, thanks to the black comedy's lack of comic value and exhausting animations.
While the use of animation recalls the tone of Terry Gilliam's work on the old BBC shows, the big problem is just how whimsical it all feels.
A moving and often funny self-portrayal of Chapman that will delight Python fans.
Such a clever conceit that you wish, ever so much, that they'd gotten it right.
It's an affectionate, imaginative tribute to the artist's idiosyncratic take on life.
You wonder if an actual documentary might have revealed more about a man so desperate to obscure himself.
...uneven and, with abrupt transitions from one animation style to another, distracting.
The most interesting aspect of "A Liar's Autobiography" is watching all the different visual styles go by...
A narrative-starved acid trip of a film, an amalgam of animated styles and anecdotes that never gel, seldom make sense and rarely generate genuine laughs.
A must see for Python disciples, this extensively produced 3D string of animations will run hot and cold with the general public.
Audience Reviews for A Liar's Autobiography - The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman
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Movie: ID: 771315269 Title: A Liar's Autobiography - The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman Release Date: 2012-11-02 00:00:00.0 MPAA: 4 Status: 1
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