Movie Talk: "The Beatles At The Movies"

I certainly don't have to tell anyone about the musical legend of the Beatles... many years and a multitude of some of the most memorable records of the entire Rock & Roll era have done that more strongly than I could ever hope to do. But it's easy to forget that they also made movies... possibly because there were only four of them, and the actual group themselves was only minimally involved in one of those four. But in their own way they were just as innovative and influential as the Beatles' music and their influence continues to be seen to this very day both in film and on television.

Nobody took "A Hard Day's Night" seriously when it was released in 1964. Even back then it had already become a well established cliche that when a rock artist became famous enough, they tried their hand at acting and made a movie. Beginning with Elvis, they all did it, and pretty much all did it badly. But instead of just one more piece of exploitative movie making to bring in a few more bucks from the young fans, the Beatles turned out a wildly funny comedy that drew raves from audiences and film critics that didn't even like the group's music. Aside from having some of the group's most classic songs, this exceptionally simply-plotted look at what a few days in the life of the band might be like as they play some concerts and prepare for a TV appearance allowed John, Paul, George & Ringo... none of who were real actors but all of whom had truly wicked senses of humor... they bring the humor of the press conferences and interviews to the screen in a film that had many comparing them to the Marx Brothers. And as wild as that seems, there really were some parallels... especially with the snappy, sarcastic John as the Groucho of the group. They also get some clever shots in at pop culture in general, including the very music industry they were THE stars of (biting the hand that fed them), advertising, and television. And this is really where the distinct personalities that each member became known for first burst forth. And they weren't afraid to give some solid laughs to their non-musical co-stars. MTV can actually be seen to have some of its earliest roots here.

For their second movie, "Help!", the group abandoned the simple black & white realistic "day in the life" approach and went full color for a world-wide travelogue that spoofed the James Bond series among a number of other adventure films. Ringo becomes the target of a cult seeking a precious ring that came into his possession, but that's just plot. What's important... and funny... is that four years before the Monty Python group made its television debut, here were the Beatles in a feature that bore more than a slight resemblance to the Pythons' surrealistic style, and featuring a number of segments that could have been excerpted whole and made perfectly fine music videos (before there were such things). The title song was even one of the earliest indications of the more serious musical territory the group was moving into. The movie didn't get as much critical respect,perhaps because of its "bigger is better" approach... even the members of the group didn't seem to like it as much as their first... but one look at "Help!" will leave you with no doubt why George Harrison once said that he thought the Pythons were carrying on the spirit of the Beatles after the Fab Four broke up. Every sketch comedy show on cable or broadcast owes something to "Help!", and it's great to see the group again interacting with the wonderfully daft Victor Spinetti, who played a lunatic TV director in "Hard Day's Night", and a mad scientist in "Help!"

"Yellow Submarine" was a bit of an odd one. The Beatles themselves didn't actually have all that much to do with it... being animated, you didn't actually see them onscreen except for one short live action sequence at the very end of the film. They didn't even do their own voices for the speaking parts. And there were only four brand new songs performed in the film. But the movie was written to exemplify what the Beatles were all about and more specifically, what the music they were making at the time was about... and the end result was possibly the best visual representation of the gaudy, flashy pop-art pop culture of the late sixties that the movies have given us. (Not the most realistic, mind you, but if you want a movie that SHOWS you what it actually FELT like to live amid the culture of "Sgt. Pepper" and San Fransisco, you couldn't do any better.) And those new songs really were gems... and somehow, with only four new tunes, the perpetually under-represented George actually got two of them, including the lovely "Only A Northern Song".

Then there's "Let It Be". There had been documentaries of rock bands before this movie, but pretty much always they had been concert films. I don't think there had even been a film that documented every step of the process of making an album in each little detail... this was long before the MTV and VH1 looks inside the creative process that have become so common in the years since. But perhaps most uniquely, for the first time there was a total "warts & all" approach that didn't even attempt to hide the downside of being a Beatle at this point in time. The group was obviously in the slow, painful process of breaking up as this film was being made, and "Let It Be" wound up being the sad but unforgettable story of the disintegration of the greatest rock band of all time, as petty... and human... as you'd never seen a band before (would there ever have been "Metalica: Some Kind Of Monster" without "Let It Be"?). And yet, somehow, there's that unforgettable rooftop concert finale, when the anger and arguments and resentments might just as well have never happened, and the Beatles return for just a few minutes to the uninhibited fun of making music together as if was 1964 again. And of course John's classic farewell: "I'd like to thank you all on behalf of myself and the group, and I certainly hope we passed the audition". You did, John... you definitely did.

Try watching any of Elvis's movies today... if you can actually make it all the way through any of them. He certainly didn't achieve his legendary status as a movie star. Even worse were movies featuring some of the all time greats like Little Richard, Chuck Berry and lesser lights like Bill Haley and the Comets... and let's not even MENTION some of the 60's atrocities with Herman's Hermits and Freddy And The Dreamers. These movies seemed old fashioned even when they came out, and positively ancient now. But the Beatles' movies crackle with a spirit and electricity that make them seem just as new and fresh as when they were first released. Like so many other things the Beatles did, their films stood out from anything we ever saw from their competition. Yeah, yeah, yeah... they did make records, sure, but they also made great movies. Let's not forget about that.