This 1964 pseudo documentary comedy captures what was Beatlemania as Paul, John, George and Ringo prepare for a television concert in England.
--Randy
Hard Day's Night, A
Directors: Richard Lester
Producers: Walter Shenson
Writers: Alun Owen
Features: Widescreen 1.66:1, Black And White(Anamophic), Disc One: Movie, New Promotional Special: "Things They Said Today...," Disc Two: "Their Production Will Be Second To None": Interviews With The Filmmakers, With The Beatles: Cast, "Working Like A Dog": The Production Crew, "Busy Working Overtime": Post Production Crew, "Listen To The Music Playing In Your Head": Sir George Martin On The HDN Songs, "Such A Clean Old Man": Memories Of Wilfrid Bramble, "I've Lost My Little Girl...Ilsa Blair Interview, "Taking Testimonial Pictures...": Robert Freeman Interview, "Dressed To The Hilt...": Gordon Millings Interview, "Dealing With The Men From The Press..."Tony Barrow Interview, "They And I Have Memories...": Klaus Voorman Interview, "Hitting The Big Time In The USA": Sid Bernstein Interview. DVD-ROM Features: Screenplay Viewer: Reproduction Of The Entire First Draft Of The Screenplay, "Remember All The Little Things": "A Hard Day's Night" Scrapbook, Roundtable Discussions: Cast, Production Crew, And Post Production Crew, Access To The DVD Destination Site, Award-winning "A Hard Day's Night" Website Archive, English: Dolby Digital Stereo(CC), French: Dolby Digital Mono, No Subtitles.
Characters:
Paul McCartney...Paul McCartney
John Lennon...John Lennon
George Harrison...George Harrison
Ringo...Ringo(Richard Starkey)
Paul's Grandfather...Wilfrid Bramble
Genre: Comedy
Review:
From that one twang that breaks the silence, followed by the song "A Hard Day's Night" You know the movie will be good. Not just good, great. That is how millions of people were first introduced to "A Hard Day's Night," a black and white film starring the Beatles that helped continue their juggernaut assault on the world in 1964. At this time the Fab Four could do no wrong. Everything they touched turned to gold. This movie was commissioned to be made in 1963 before their initial storming of America via "The Ed Sullivan Show." At this time almost every pop group made a disastrous movie, it was expected. The Beatles were against doing a movie because of all the other film busts. United Artists had the rights to the soundtrack and was not going to spend more than two hundred thousand pounds, so they felt there was minimal risk involved. Having Richard Lester as director helped swing the Beatles in favor of going ahead with the film. They liked a television show in England called "The Goon Show" which Richard Lester helmed and Peter Sellers starred in. United Artists wanted this movie out quick, but the Beatles' busy schedule kept it from being started until the middle of 1964. The reason the studio wanted it quick, giving Richard Lester seven weeks to shoot it and three weeks to edit it to completion, was that they where worried that the Beatles fame would be fleeting like so many groups before them. United Artists didn't want to be stuck with old product. As history has evidenced, the studio had nothing to worry about. Almost forty years later, "A Hard Day's Night" is still as fresh and vibrant today as it was when it first rocked the world, thanks to DVD technology.
The story isn't much of a story in "A Hard Day's Night." The style it was shot in gave it a pseudo documentary look. A lot of the footage looks like it could be newsreel film stock, but it isn't.
There are the shots of the crowds that incessantly mill around any place that the Beatles might be. The black and white film stock adds to that image. Basically the story is supposedly how a day in the life of the Beatles would appear if it were captured on film by a movie crew. The movie opens up with the Beatles being chased down a street by a huge crowd of fans. They barely make it to a train as it pulls out of a railroad station in England. On board are the four Beatles--Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo. Accompanying them are their manager Norm(Norman Rossington) and his assistant, Shake(John Junkin). Complicating matters is Paul's grandfather, played by Wilfrid Bramble, who has somehow been given over to Paul's care. The grandfather is a "mixer" or instigator and is continually causing problems for anyone he comes into contact with. The boys are on their way to a television station where they are to perform live for an audience in the studio. All the miscues and possible problems that could be dart out to hinder the Beatles' completion of this project.
How could this film fail? By the time it was released in July of 1964, the Beatles were such a force that nothing could prevent it from being a smash hit. That the critics approved was just icing on the cake. There were twelve reasons, not counting the four Beatles, that the film was guaranteed to be a blockbuster. Twelve was the amount of songs that were in the movie and soundtrack album. Unlike the rock groups of today, every song on a Beatles's record could have been a hit if released. The only thing stopping that was the fast pace that the Beatles would release a new album with more potential hits. At one time in 1965 the top five Billboard singles were Beatle tunes.
This may sound a little weird, but I have always considered the Beatles to be the last great comedy team. In some ways this movie may remind people of a Marx Brothers movie. Space and time are bent to accomodate the Beatles style of humor. Early in the movie the Beatles have a tiff with a passenger in their train coach. They leave and do many things to bother him, the strangest being running along the outside of the train waving and making faces at him. At this time Ringo is seen playing with a cigarette and stooping like Groucho Marx. This only lasts a second, but it is definitely there. Later there is a sort of Keystone Cop chase by the British constables of Ringo and the rest of the boys. Then there is the silent communication that is seen periodically as in the press conference party when the boys silently tell each other it is time to go. This is a team at work like the great ones such as the Three Stooges or the Marx Brothers themselves.
The camera work was all over the place. There were all sort of angle shots. Memorable are the shots of the Beatles running down a fire escape while being filmed from below. As the Beatles were running around haphazardly on a large grass field they were filmed from above as a last minute decision, according to one of the cameramen in the special features section. There was a nearby helicopter used by the crew for transportation and Richard Lester sent the cameramen up to get some aerial shots. The battery in the camera was slowly going down which gave a speeded up gait to the Beatles' antics. Richard Lester loved it and congratulated the cameramen, but it was a lucky accident. In the special features section Richard Lester says that when he is invited by film schools to give a lecture he is constantly embarrassed to admit he had no plan or technique for the movie when someone asks how he approached the filming. He said he just told his cameramen to film and he edited what was given him. Lester only had three weeks to do both the film and sound editing.
This DVD though in black and white is outstanding in its' clarity. The sheen of sweat on the faces of the Beatles being filmed under television hot lights can be clearly seen. Even when the camera pans to the monitors in the control booth in the television studio the look is still sharp. The sound in Dolby stereo is a great improvement over the original mono, which is still an option, but why wasn't DTS or THX used. We all know why; the next edition will have it, to force people to buy the DVD again.
After all this praise for the movie, I have to bitch about the special features section. The DVD comes with two discs. One contains the movie and a special feature while the second disc is all special features. It is pure agony and time consuming to go through the features. You have to push the forward button for each feature and every one of its' subset features. Then once finally finished you have to push buttons to get out of that feature and then repeat yourself for all the other features with their subsets. There is no magic button to run through all the features nonstop. There are a lot of features. Most of the acting cast that was still alive other than the Beatles is represented. Even the behind the scenes people have interesting anecdotes to tell. If I was to type all the features and the subsets you and I would go blind. The packaging artists must have felt the same way because there is no written feature section on the box or anywhere other than the second disc when viewed on a television screen. This DVD even has DVD-Rom capabilities such as being able to view the screenplay and giving the viewer access to an award winning website archive.
One of the more interesting facts I gleaned from the troublesome special feature section was that Wilfrid Bramble who played Paul's grandfather was Steptoe on "Steptoe And Son" which "Sanford And Son" starring Red Foxx was based on in the United States. Black and white film clips of the show are shown with Bramble looking very scruffy as a junk dealer would. Bramble had died by the time this feature was made and it is someone else that points out that in real life Bramble was a fastidious dresser. After spiffing up when the filming of "Steptoe And Son" was done he could walk outside the studio and be ignored by autograph seekers as he passed them by. In "A Hard Day's Night" Bramble is constantly being called a very clean old man which turned out to be a play on what Steptoe's son would call Steptoe on the television show which was, "You dirty old man!"
In "I've Lost My Little Girl..." feature, actress Ilsa Blair tells how she had a romantic scene with Paul McCartney, but it was left on the cutting room floor. Ostensibly Richard Lester told her its' pace did not fit the flow of the film, but I think it was realized that the other Beatles were jealous of Paul being "the cute one" and this omission would reduce friction.
In the "I Act The Clown..." feature, Jeremy Lloyd mentions his jumping up and down scene with Ringo on a crowded dance floor. He was told by Richard Lester that Ringo had been told to do whatever he did, so he purposely jumped as high as he could knowing Ringo was a poor jumper. Lloyd also mentions that he was jumping to find his girlfriend Charlotte Rampling("The Night Porter") who was somewhere on the dance floor.
This movie is entertaining and informative. The entertaining part is obvious. The informative part is realizing how popular the Beatles were in their heyday. Mobs of teenagers waited for them on every street and even camping outside their apartments. No artist today can command that adoration, so to viewers who were not alive at this era in history it is probably difficult to comprehend. Watching this film which is a fictionalized telling of their everyday real life at that time may help. The interviews by outsiders that detail the fanaticism of their fans will confirm the legend of the Beatles.
The two disc DVD of "A Hard Day's Night" is totally recommended.
----Randy