One of the funniest films to come from any member of the Monty Python troop "A Fish Called Wanda" is a delightful concoction created by John Cleese. Directed by the late veteran director Charles Crichton (well known in the U.K. for the classic Ealing comedies that he directed including "The Lavender Hill Mob" with the late Sir Alec Guinness, "The Titfield Thunderbolt", "The Battle of the Sexes" which preceded and influenced the Python crew) and Cleese the comedy has a delightfully funny mean streak that recalls the best of Python while somehow channeling the charm of a more mainstream romantic comedy. This tasteful confection finally gets the special edition that it was due a long, long time ago. This low budget comedy featuring Kevin Kline, Jaime Lee Curtis and Python stalwart Michael Palin (the only member of the Python troop to appear in projects involving all of his former collegues) in addition to Cleese became the little comedy that could ended. "A Fish Called Wanda" ended up being nominated for three Academy Awards for screenplay, direction and winning Kevin Kline the award for Best Supporting Actor. ***

Wanda (Curtis), Otto (Kline), George (Tom Georgeson) and stuttering Ken (Palin) team up for a diamond heist. When Wanda and the dense Otto decide they want the diamonds for themselves they betray George. George however is one step ahead of his "team"; he's hidden the diamonds. Now Wanda has to find out where the diamonds are and decides the only way to find out is to get close to George's lawyer the hen pecked Archie Leach (Cleese) . Wanda finds herself falling for Archie with the possibility that he'll end up on Otto's hit list. --

We finally get a two disc edition that's worthy of this classic comedy. We get a 30 minute documentary on the making of the movie directed by John Cork with new interviews from Cleese, Kline, Palin, Curtis and producer Michael Shamberg. It's a humorous documentary that features plenty of clips to illustrate the main points but, more importantly, brief snippets of cut scenes and discussions of how Cleese elected to reshoot some key scenes after talking to Robert Towne all of 10 minutes after a screening. ***

We also get two vintage featurettes on the film with plenty of behind-the-scenes footage. "On Location" curiously entitled "Kulture Vulture" in the extras section revisits the locations where the film was shot. There's also a discussion on the inspiration for the project. There are some interview outtakes included as pretty easy to find Easter Eggs one which is interrupted by Jaime Lee Curtis' cell phone ringing with the theme from "Halloween". She discusses the stupid fish gifts that they gave each other over the years. There is also an outtake scene between Curtis and Palin that was cut. ***

The most important extra here are the deleted/alternate scenes that Cleese pulled from vintage videotapes. Sadly the original deleted scenes/alternate takes no longer exist except on video. Cleese provides an introduction for each deleted scene/alternate take discussing why they were cut (in some cases he has no idea now or wishes he would have kept a couple of them in) as well as why they reshot the ending of the film. ---

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