June 25, 2009
The Beatles become a more and more curious subject as time goes on, especially in the circles I run in. I grew up listening to them, and never thought a thing of judging their music. I always liked it, which is no surprise if one knows that the 1968 animated film Yellow Submar...( read more)ine is one of my all-time favourite movies. I've got some of the figures produced from that film hanging about my apartment, as well as a well-worn shirt advertising the film. It was one of my earlier DVD acquisitions, before it went out of print. However, it was not until sometime in college that I began to learn that there were actually people who flat-out disliked or even hated the Beatles. I had no idea, and honestly still don't quite understand the people that do. Generally, it seems that this opinion is more response to response than response to the original stimulus (that is, their music). Obviously there are going to be people who just dislike their music, but mostly I find people who have been annoyed by how much other people like them. It's really a shame, but it is the nature of people to form such opinions (and I'm not immune to them myself, though I tend more to exaggerate dislike when things become more and more popular, but never move from like to dislike over it) so I suppose we're best off accepting it. Obviously if one took the concept of reviewing this movie and the concept of not talking about the Beatles' music and put them in a room, they'd not shake hands or greet, they'd stare in slack-jawed wonder at how you put them in the same room. I'm not planning to review the music or discuss it in detail, but I'm not going to skip around it either.
The Beatles (John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Richard "Ringo Starr" Starkey, if you somehow don't know) are set to perform on television one day in London, away from their home of Liverpool. Coming along with them are their manager Norm (Norman Rossington), road manager Shake (John Junkin), and Paul's grandfather (Wilfrid Brambell). Paul refers to his grandfather as a "mixer" or troublemaker, and suggests that he needs to be watched closely as they go about their busy schedules. Norm and Shake conflict periodically, usually from the subtle incitement of said grandfather. The boys try to escape their responsibilities as stars, skipping out on Norm whenever possible, whether assigned to respond to fan mail or to simply show up for any performance. They wander in and out of situations that they stumble into, while Paul's grandfather attempts to feed his own desires, which are usually a mix of greed and lechery. As a final spiteful act to remove himself from the watchful eye of others, he even tries to incite Ringo to leaving the group because of their relentless mockery of them.
This isn't a plot-heavy film, though it's not quite as plotless as many of the "rock and roll films" that predated (or followed) it. Or, at least, the absence of plot is not so worrisome. The Beatles are all rather charismatic as actors (even if clearly pretty amateurish), and Alun Owen's script serves them well. The words he wrote for them at least some of them agreed were very natural and believable for their real personalities, which was Owen's intention. It makes for a snappy, cracking sort of wit, one-liners, sarcastic retorts and wordplay bandied about without pause for laughter or between funny lines. There's a nice injection of absurdity to it all that gives a lovely hint of a smile with a certain element of snarkiness to all of them, as they find themselves mistaken for people they're not (or occasionally people they are) and they always take advantage of the people making these mistakes. Not cruelly, but often falling into the role they're mistaken for and responding with honest opinion. Nowhere is this more apparent than in George's mistaken appearance in an advertising office. He's taken for a new spokesperson, which he attempts to fight only briefly and eventually neglects to argue with, after which he sparks a bit of fear in the trend-obsessed advertising manager Simon, played by Kenneth Haigh.
Owen's script intentionally and clearly draws a neat little box around each of the boys, with Lennon as the smart-ass, McCartney as the "sensible" one, George as the shy one and Ringo as the good-hearted whipping boy. This is certainly an oversimplification of any human being, but it's appropriate when one is basing a film around a band as a purely business-oriented enterprise. It's not really the place for nuanced characterization and pathos, and it's good not only that Owen made the decision, but professional of the Beatles to accept the roles and run with them. There's no real mean-spiritedness to all of it, with the closest thing to an antagonist being Paul's grandfather, who's made out to be enough of a "rascal" (there's really no better word) that he's still fun, even as we see the havoc he creates. Brambell deserves plenty of credit for this, as his strange character is just a fantastically over-the-top foil for the rather subdued nature of four guys who didn't really do any acting before. Richard Lester directs it pretty brilliantly (nevermind John Jympson's tightly sloppy editing) and keeps everything in control and in place, which makes the whole thing hugely entertaining. While he bemusedly rejects the idea, certainly this film has some part in the origin of the promotional music video, with nicely cut montages and actual scenes behind their songs, from the beginning act of running from screaming fans on to the final television stage performance.
I normally express a general shrugging neutrality about the Beatles' music prior to 1966's Revolver (occasionally scaling it back to Help! or Beatles for Sale, but rarely earlier), often finding it too formulaically poppy and repetitive for my own tastes. I've never quite figured out why, however, but in films a lot of music that I shrug at or like all right seems to strike just the right sound dynamic and image juxtaposition to really make it pop out. I found myself with renewed appreciation for the songs the film contains, and for the greater nuance in the instrumentation than I had previously noticed. Generally one thinks of these songs and their simple and repetitive choruses ("She Loves You," "A Hard Day's Night," "Can't Buy Me Love," etc.) but there's actually a decent amount going on behind them. I'm not saying I suddenly rate it as equally interesting when compared to their later work, but still, it's more impressive than I once realized. It's this that I think is often missed by other people, but plenty of folks simply don't want to see it (or don't care about whether they see it).
What's best about the film, though, is not the music--it's great that a film built to advertise a band was controlled by strong voices like Owen and Lester, who made it an interesting movie in its own right, in some strange paradoxical way making it function almost like the Monkees (whose show was allegedly inspired by the film) in that it could be about a band that doesn't really exist and just happens to hold the Beatles' music as if the actors playing this made-up band were the ones who made it. In essence, the music is good, but separate from the main characters in the film even though it is indeed them who wrote and performed it--and of course that fact adds an exciting note of authenticity and justification to their casting. It's a very tenuous tone and quite a balance to strike, but the film maintains it perfectly, never losing its pace or its sense of humour, never stopping to rely completely on who is in the movie even as it feeds on the energy of that fact.
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