''The Crimson Permanent Assurance'' is a 1983 British

swashbuckling A swashbuckler is a genre of European adventure literature that focuses on a heroic protagonist stock character who is skilled in swordsmanship, acrobatics, and guile, and possesses chivalrous ideals. A "swashbuckler" protagonist is heroic, ...

comedy Comedy is a genre of dramatic works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. Origins Comedy originated in ancient Greec ...

short film A short film is a film with a low running time. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of not more than 40 minutes including all credits". Other film o ...

directed by

Terry Gilliam Terrence Vance Gilliam ( ; born 22 November 1940) is an American-British filmmaker, comedian, collage film, collage animator, and actor. He gained stardom as a member of the Monty Python comedy troupe alongside John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Pa ...

and starring Sydney Arnold and Guy Bertrand. It plays as the prelude to the film ''

Monty Python's The Meaning of Life ''Monty Python's The Meaning of Life'', also known simply as ''The Meaning of Life'', is a 1983 British musical sketch comedy film written and performed by the Monty Python troupe, directed by Terry Jones. ''The Meaning of Life'' was the last f ...

'' (1983). The film includes actor

Matt Frewer Matthew George Frewer (born January 4, 1958) is an American-Canadian actor and comedian. He portrayed the 1980s icon Max Headroom in the 1985 TV film and 1987 Max Headroom (TV series), television series of the same name. He became prominent when ...

's debut performance.

Plot

The elderly British employees of the Permanent Assurance Company, a staid

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

firm which has recently been taken over by the Very Big Corporation of America (VBCA), rebel against their much younger corporate masters when one of them is sacked. Having locked the surviving supervisors in the safe, and forced their boss to walk a makeshift plank out a window, they commandeer their

Edwardian In the United Kingdom, the Edwardian era was a period in the early 20th century that spanned the reign of King Edward VII from 1901 to 1910. It is commonly extended to the start of the First World War in 1914, during the early reign of King Ge ...

office building, which suddenly weighs anchor, uses its scaffolding and tarpaulins as sails, and is turned into a

pirate ship Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...

. The stone office building starts to move as if it were a ship. Leaving the

City of London The City of London, also known as ''the City'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and Districts of England, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in England. It is the Old town, his ...

, they sail to another financial centre and then proceed to attack the VBCA's skyscraper, using, among other things, wooden

filing cabinet A filing cabinet (or sometimes file cabinet in American English) is a piece of office furniture for storing paper documents in file folders. In the most simple context, it is an enclosure for drawer (furniture), drawers in which articles are sto ...

s which have been transformed into

carronade A carronade is a short, smoothbore, cast-iron cannon which was used by the Royal Navy. It was first produced by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, and was used from the last quarter of the 18th century to the mid-19th cen ...

s and swords fashioned from the blades of a ceiling fan. On ropes, they swing into the board room and engage the executives of VBCA in hand-to-hand combat, vanquishing them. After their hard-earned victory, the clerks sing a heroic

sea shanty A sea shanty, shanty, chantey, or chanty () is a genre of traditional Folk music, folk song that was once commonly sung as a work song to accompany rhythmical labor aboard large Merchant vessel, merchant Sailing ship, sailing vessels. The term ...

as they "sail the wide accountan-sea" in search of further conquests. However, they unceremoniously end up falling off the edge of the world, due to their belief about the shape of the world being "disastrously wrong". Typically of how the Pythons would weave previously "terminated" plot lines into later scenes in their projects (such as "

The Spanish Inquisition The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition () was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs, King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile and lasted until 1834. It began toward the end of the ''Reconquista'' and aim ...

" in ''

Flying Circus Barnstorming was a form of entertainment in which stunt pilots performed tricks individually or in groups that were called flying circuses. Devised to "impress people with the skill of pilots and the sturdiness of planes," it became popular in t ...

'', or the repeated references to

swallow The swallows, martins, and saw-wings, or Hirundinidae are a family of passerine songbirds found around the world on all continents, including occasionally in Antarctica. Highly adapted to aerial feeding, they have a distinctive appearance. The ...

s in ''

Holy Grail The Holy Grail (, , , ) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miraculous healing powers, sometimes providing eternal youth or sustenanc ...

''), ''The Crimson Permanent Assurance'' suddenly re-emerges in the middle of ''The Meaning of Life''. After the donor scene, the film shifts to a modern boardroom in the VBCA headquarters, where the executives debate about the meaning of life (and whether or not people are wearing enough hats). The debate is halted when one executive asks "Has anyone noticed that building there before?", which turns out to be the office building/pirate ship of the Crimson Permanent Assurance. As the beginning of the battle between the clerks and the VBCA is repeated, the raid is suddenly halted by a falling skyscraper crushing the Permanent Assurance Company building, accompanied by a voice-over apologizing for the "unwarranted attack by the supporting feature".

Cast

Pirates * Sydney Arnold *

Myrtle Devenish Myrtle Devenish (29 July 1912 – 21 January 2007) was a British film actress. She appeared in Terry Gilliam's 1985 cult film ''Brazil'', in a 1988 episode of Crimewatch, and had a role in the 1980s drama Together. Played the part of Beryl, one ...

* Eric Francis * Billy John * Len Marten *

John Scott Martin John Scott Martin (1 April 1926 – 6 January 2009) was an English actor born in Toxteth, Liverpool, Lancashire. He made many film, stage and television appearances, but one of his most famous, though unseen, roles was as a Dalek operator in t ...

* Larry Noble * Paddy Ryan *

Leslie Sarony image:Leslie Holmes and Leslie Sarony circa 1934.JPG, A W.D. & H.O. Wills, Wills cigarette card from the 'Radio Celebrities' series, 1934; Sarony on right Leslie Sarony (born Leslie Legge Frye; 22 January 1897 – 12 February 1985) was a Britis ...

* Wally Thomas * Douglas Cooper * George Daly * Chick Fowles * Terry Grant * Robin Hewlett * Juba Kennerly * Tony Lang * Ronald Shilling * Albert Welch *

Nigel Hawthorne Sir Nigel Barnard Hawthorne (5 April 1929 – 26 December 2001) was an English actor. He is known for his stage acting and his portrayal of Sir Humphrey Appleby, the permanent secretary in the 1980s sitcom ''Yes Minister'' and the Cabinet Secre ...

Very Big Corporation of America * Guy Bertrand * Andrew Bicknell *

Ross Davidson William Russell "Ross" Davidson (25 August 1949 – 16 October 2006) was a Scottish actor best known for his role as Andy O'Brien in the BBC soap opera ''EastEnders''. Career Davidson started his working life as a physical education teacher ...

* Peter Mantle * Peter Merrill * Camerom Miller * Gareth Milne * Eric Stovell * Jack Armstrong * Robert Carrick *

Terry Jones Terence Graham Parry Jones (1 February 1942 – 21 January 2020) was a Welsh actor, comedian, director, historian, writer and member of the Monty Python comedy troupe. After graduating from Oxford University with a degree in English, Jones a ...

Graham Chapman Graham Chapman (8 January 1941 – 4 October 1989) was a British actor, comedian and writer. He was one of the six members of the Surreal humour, surrealist comedy group Monty Python. He portrayed authority figures such as The Colonel (Monty Py ...

Eric Idle Eric Idle (born 29 March 1943) is an English actor, comedian, songwriter, musician, screenwriter and playwright. He was a member of the British comedy group Monty Python and the parody rock band the Rutles. Idle studied English at Pembroke Co ...

Michael Palin Sir Michael Edward Palin (; born 5 May 1943) is an English actor, comedian, writer, and television presenter. He was a member of the Monty Python comedy group. He received the BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award, BAFTA Fellowship in 2013 and was knig ...

Production

Having originally conceived the story as a six-minute

animated Animation is a filmmaking technique whereby image, still images are manipulated to create Motion picture, moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on cel, transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and e ...

sequence in ''Monty Python's The Meaning of Life'', intended for placement at the end of Part V, Terry Gilliam convinced the other members of

Monty Python Monty Python, also known as the Pythons, were a British comedy troupe formed in 1969 consisting of Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. The group came to prominence for the sketch comedy ser ...

to allow him to produce and direct it as a

live action Live action is a form of cinematography or videography that uses photography instead of animation. Some works combine live action with animation to create a live-action animated feature film. Live action is used to define film, video games o ...

piece instead. According to Gilliam, the film's rhythm, length, and style of cinematography made it a poor fit as a scene in the larger movie, so it was presented as a supplementary short ahead of the film. It was a common practice in British cinemas to show an unrelated short feature before the main movie, a holdover from the older practice of showing a full-length

B movie A B movie, or B film, is a type of cheap, low-budget commercial motion picture. Originally, during the Classical Hollywood cinema, Golden Age of Hollywood, this term specifically referred to films meant to be shown as the lesser-known second ...

ahead of the main feature. By the mid-1970s the short features were of poorer quality (often

Public Information Film Public information films (PIFs) are a series of government-commissioned short films, shown during television advertising breaks in the United Kingdom. The name is sometimes also applied, ''faute de mieux'', to similar films from other countries, ...

s) or travelogues. The Pythons had already produced one spoof travelogue narrated by

John Cleese John Marwood Cleese ( ; born 27 October 1939) is an English actor, comedian, screenwriter, producer, and Television presenter, presenter. Emerging from the Footlights, Cambridge Footlights in the 1960s, he first achieved success at the Edinbur ...

, ''Away from It All'', which was shown before ''

Life of Brian ''Monty Python's Life of Brian'' (also known as ''Life of Brian'') is a 1979 British biblical black comedy film starring and written by the comedy group Monty Python (Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michae ...

'' (1979) in Britain.

In popular culture

The Crimson Permanent Assurance plays a prominent role in

Charles Stross Charles David George "Charlie" Stross (born 18 October 1964) is a British writer of science fiction and fantasy. Stross specialises in hard science fiction and space opera. Between 1994 and 2004, he was also an active writer for the magazine ' ...

's 2013 novel '' Neptune's Brood'', where the CPA is an interstellar insurance company that sponsors space pirates who double as cargo auditors. The CPA also features in the novel's

twist ending A plot twist is a literary technique that introduces a radical change in the direction or expected outcome of the plot in a work of fiction. When it happens near the end of a story, it is known as a twist ending or surprise ending. It may change ...

.Stross, ''Neptune's Brood ''(2013),

References

External links

*
Companies owned by The Very Big Corporation of America
{{DEFAULTSORT:Crimson Permanent Assurance, The 1983 comedy films 1983 short films 1983 films 1980s English-language films 1980s British films British comedy short films Films scored by John Du Prez Films set in 1983 Films set in London Films set in offices Films shot at EMI-Elstree Studios Films with screenplays by Terry Gilliam Monty Python films Pirate films Short films directed by Terry Gilliam English-language comedy short films