by ·Comments Off on Yellow Submarine (1968, George Dunning)

What a movie to watch as a sober adult. Obviously I needed to see this as a Beatles completist, but also it came up indirectly (about a thousand times) in the last novel I read. Unfunny Monty Python outtakes mixed with a childrens adventure story voiced by Beatle impersonators, it’s not bad.

Meanies:

But oh, the designs! There’s some really wild animation and character design in this. And the story pauses six or ten times to play an illustrated Beatles song, nothing wrong with that. I thought maybe “Only a Northern Song” would make some kind of sense in the movie’s context, but no, it’s just a weird song.

The Beatles are known to be witty, so the movie’s writers (known for childrens shows and also Love Story) are in “witty” mode. Jeremy Hillary Boob turns out to be a blue-faced brown and pink puffball, who I’ve never noticed on the front of a sweatshirt or anywhere else.

Fake John was really called John, Ringo and George were Paul, and Paul was Geoff – besides this movie, the gang’s most prominent role was when Geoff played “drinking villager” in Blood on Satan’s Claw. I’ve seen shorts by Dunning and by animators Paul Driessen and Alison De Vere.

Everyone’s got World Cup fever:

by ·Comments Off on The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus (1969, Michael Lindsay-Hogg)

Meant to be televised in 1969 but withheld for decades because the Stones were afraid of The Who – and for good reason, the latter’s version of “A Quick One” is the greatest performance in any rock doc I’ve seen lately.

Staged inside a circus tent with acrobats and stuff in between music acts, passing through a wild Lennon/Ono act and culminating in a decently good Stones set.

Of the bands I didn’t already know, Taj Mahal’s amped-up bar band > Jethro Tull’s flutey rock > Marianne Faithfull’s pretty folk.

by ·Comments Off on Magical Mystery Tour (1967, The Beatles)

This collection of TV music videos with a loose framing story seems more like first-take/b-roll mess. Is it for kids? Was it influenced by The Monkees? They probably explained briefly in Anthology how this turned out so badly, and I already forgot.

At least each song gets a different visual treatment and some are nice (like the color-filtered mountainscapes over an instrumental song) and not just over-literal imagery (showing policemen in a row for the line “policemen in a row”). And at least during the awful narrative parts (Ringo squabbling with his aunt on a bus) we get nice symphonic versions of early band hits.

Have they been watching Kenneth Anger? Paul does his best silly walk. Ridiculous striptease with the Bonzo Dog Band. I don’t know if people back then knew who Mal was, but after you’ve seen Get Back it’s impossible not to notice him in every scene here. The anonymous veteran co-director was poor old Bernie Knowles, DP of The 39 Steps, now working with DP Richard Starkey.

by ·Comments Off on Help! (1965, Richard Lester)

I’m on a 1960s rock & roll kick. Rewatched this a few months after Anthology, getting some nice HD screenshots of Eleanor Bron, including when I seen her in the arms of Paul saying “I can say no more.”

by ·Comments Off on George Harrison: Living in the Material World (2011, Martin Scorsese)

Feels like an outtakes shuffle of pre- and early-Beatles stories with long lingers on old photos and scraps of George solo songs, then finds its footing as the Beatles start losing theirs, around the 1hr mark as drugs turn to meditation and Ravi Shankar and the gurus enter the picture. As he uses clips from the Get Back sessions and the Concert for Bangladesh, my Beatles movies are starting to eat each other. Conclusions: George was a beautiful man, and Yoko didn’t break up the Beatles – Eric Clapton did.

by ·Comments Off on Rock Doc Trio: Silkworm, Cave, Harrison

Couldn’t You Wait (2013, Seth Pomeroy)

I finally got over my terror of watching this, thinking it would be too sad. Contains some of the stories I’ve long wanted to hear – Albini recording them at no cost, why/how they changed labels. Pomeroy does a great job editing the live and studio material together, and includes a feature-length “Live Worm” compilation of concert songs. I’m only halfway through the other extras – it’s a treasure trove. “If you cant get into Silkworm then God hates you and you’re an asshole.”

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The Concert for Bangladesh (1972, Saul Swimmer)

Continuing my post-Get Back solo Beatle explorations (albums played so far: Ringo x1, John x2, Paul x3 and All Things Must Pass). My 2003 AVI file often looks better than the HD Peter Jackson movie, hmmm. George introduces Ravi Shanker, pleading with the crowd to follow along (it’s “a little more serious than our music”), then tears through some “All Things” hits. Billy Preston and Ringo and Leon Russell get vocal turns. “While My Guitar” and “Here Comes the Sun,” a four-song Bob Dylan feature, then a couple closing numbers. Happy to discover it’s another one of the great concert films.

George, Bob, Leon:

Ravi and company:

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This Much I Know to Be True (2022, Andrew Dominik)

Dominik repeats his One More Time With Feeling feat of having each song be visually distinct, maybe more impressive here since he’s got a limited toolkit in a single location and keeps showing us the tools (lights, dolly tracks) yet somehow surprising us within the moment. Another difference is that I already loved “Skeleton Tree” before watching the previous movie, while this one revealed the beauty of “Ghosteen” and “Carnage.”