Like almost every other aspect of pop music today, when it comes to films establishing a music group’s identity and style, The Beatles did it first, and did it best. Much of the credit surely belongs to the director Richard Lester, who took the exuberance and playfulness of John, Paul, George and Ringo and made it into cinematic gold: the movie explodes with weird humor, inside jokes, whimsical montages and pure freedom. That was as much the freedom conveyed by the Beatles’ 1960s attitude of anti-authority and anti-establishment sensibilities signified by their unkempt hairstyles and dismissal of press questioning as it was the freedom from traditional cinematic convention that required a story and linear editing and classical shot progression.
It’s one of the reasons the One Direction documentary from this year works: it’s the closest of all the recent pop docs that have been released lately to achieving again the excitement not only of following a new musical group from show to show but of actually being in and among the weird and distinctive personalities of the members of such a group. But you can’t beat the real thing. It helps that The Beatles would go on to create some of the most important music of the century. Without that extra bit of credibility behind them, their personalities in A Hard Day’s Night may not be quite so endearing.
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