“Yesterday,” the fantasy movie that imagines a world in which only one person remembers the Beatles music, goes into wide release today and I can’t wait. No matter how lame the film itself turns out to be, any movie with a lot of Beatles songs can’t be half-bad. The Beatles themselves only made four or five movies (depending on how you count “Yellow Submarine”) and two of them — “Help” and “Magical Mystery Tour” are just not good. Still the boys from Liverpool have inspired a whole sub-genre of films, of which the following ten are my favorites:
1. A Hard Day’s Night
The first and still the best. I saw it when it first came out in 1964 thought it was a romp but as I’ve rewatched it over the years I’ve come to believe it’s the best rock and roll movie ever made; which is remarkable because this was just supposed to be a cheap exploitation movie. The Beatles themselves are witty and exuberant, still enjoying their monstrous fame. But you begin to see how closed-in and claustrophobic their lives have become, crammed onto trains, cars, dressing rooms, and narrow halls. Then suddenly, when they’ve had enough, they burst out, race down a fire escape, and run wild to “Can’t Buy Me Love.” An exhilarating scene.
2, Concert for George
It’s a mystery that George, the third-ranking Beatle, should have been the one with the best post-Beatle career and turned out by far to have been the “deepest” one of the whole group. He explored the harder questions of life with eyes wide open and had a remarkable capacity for friendship. When he died too early at age 58, his friends (and what a group of friends: Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton, Tom Petty, Billy Preston, Ravi Shankar, and Monty Python) celebrated his life with a concert that still moves me every time I watch it, especially any number in which his look-alike son Dhani participates.
3. Across the Universe
This is a movie that shouldn’t work, but somehow does solely through the power of the Beatles music. The film purports to depict the culture’s transformation of the Sixties, including the flower power movement, the Vietnam War, urban riots, elite campus privilege, Weathermen-style violence. The main characters all take their names from Beatles songs — Jude, Prudence, Jo-Jo, Max, Sadie and Lucy — and the full Beatles catalog gets a good work-out. It’s all a little mind-blowing.
4. How the Beatles Changed the World
The world broke in two in 1964 — there were people who came to maturity before the Beatles and those who came after them, and their sensibilities could not have been more different. This is a fairly recent documentary about how the Beatles influenced youth culture and created the way we look, talk, dress, think, and act today.
5. George Harrison: Living in the Material World
A Martin Scorcese documentary that is a good companion piece to “The Concert for George.” Given George’s wide range of artistic and spiritual interests it’s not surprising that he inspires the most thoughtful commentary.
6. Backbeat
The teenage Beatles transformed themselves into an electrifying rock and roll band when they went off to play the seedy clubs in Hamburg. This is that story, framed through the lens of a love triage among John Lennon, the fifth Beatle Stu Sutcliffe, and Stu’s German girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr. No classic Beatles songs, just the rock and roll covers they performed during this time.
7. Yellow Submarine
A trippy cartoon feature once experienced most fully by stoned teens is now marketed as a multi-generational family movie. This is best seen in the theaters or on a big-screen TV because the animation is dazzling.
8. Nowhere Boy
A dramatization of John Lennon’s teen years, particularly his fraught relationship with the mother who abandoned him and the aunt who raised him. The sub-plot is the creation of the Beatles themselves, including the famous meeting with Paul and the recruiting of George.
9. John and Yoko: Above Us Only Sky
When John and Yoko sat down to record the “Imagine” album they brought along a camera crew to document their every move. This narcissistic strategy resulted in a surprisingly compelling window into early Seventies life. There they are, smoking constantly, lying around their pig-sty bedroom, or eating greasy food at the communal breakfast table. But it’s undeniably fascinating to watch the songs on this album evolve over the course of the recording session.
10. Let It Be
This documentary about the making of the “Let It Be” album is a little hard to follow given the lack of a narrator. It’s also painful to watch how far apart these four former mates have grown. They barely speak to each other except when they can’t avoid it. And the constant presence of Yoko in the recording study casts a giant pall over the whole enterprise. But the movie is redeemed by the great ending, when they play together live for one last time on the roof of their recording studio in the middle of London.
Really!!? 