Another Hard Day's Night

Thats a good way of starting the new year, with the joyous A HARD DAY'S NIGHT, reminding us oldies of what 1964 was like when the world was, as it seemed to us teenagers then, fresh and young. I was a Beatle fanatic so seeing them up close like this, and then in colour in HELP! in '65 was sheer bliss. Here is my 2014 review: (now for EIGHT DAYS A WEEK).

London's British Film Institute is celebrating the 50th anniversary of The Beatles first film A HARD DAY'S NIGHT, with an extended run of 34 screenings. I have the dvd but it would be nice to pop along and see it on the big screen again. It is very special to me. Prior to then, movies with pop stars were lame efforts like those early 60s Billy Fury and Cliff Richard vehicles (see music label), even the Elvis films were starting to look tired - then Richard Lester came along with Alun Owen's witty script and turned it all upside down. It was like a French New Wave zany comedy and not just to expoit the worldwide success of the Fab Four. It is both comedy and almost documentary showing the boys as prisoners of their success, and also some of those songs are staged and filmed like the first pop promos. Lester also included some veteran British players who play perfectly with The Boys. 

It chronicles a few days in the life of the band, on trains (Patti Boyd is one of the schoolgirls), in the studio, trying to get some space for themselves as they are pursued by hysterical fans, clueless reporters, a fretful manager and Paul's grand-dad (Steptoe's Wilfrid Brambell) the essence of a "dirty old man" though they keep saying how clean he is here! The moptops are all individuals - we all had our favourites - and are all great here. The great Victor Spinetti (see label) is a scream as the neurotic tv studio director driven to distraction by the Boys. Add in that dry Scouse humour as the four lads ooze charisma and charm, and of course those songs!. Lester too keeps it all flying - it revolutionised screen musicals at a time when Hollywood was still churning out moribund embalmed versions of stage shows like MY FAIR LADY. Jacques Demy in France though was doing something similar with his UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG - and the later LES DEMOISELLES DE ROCHEFORT. 1965 saw Lester with The Beatles again and more pop promos but in colour this time, with HELP! I love that one even more ...

A HARD DAY'S NIGHT covers a very special moment for me, being 18 and new in London, and loving the Beatles and their music. That summer I had to stay out in London all night, as I went to see a late night French movie (at the old Academy in Oxford Street) and could not get home to the suburbs - no late night transport then! - so as dawn broke I was walking down Regent Street (where I would later spend over 20 years working) as the sun was rising over the old London Pavilion cinema where A HARD DAY'S NIGHT was playing, so the posters and pictures were everywhere. It suddenly felt good to be 18 and new in London as dawn was breaking .... its one of those moments that stay with one! 

A movie buff friend of mine, not a pop lover, was "disappointed" with A HARD DAY'S NIGHT when he saw it recently, but as I said, you would not judge it as an ordinary film. Lester created a perfect defining 1960s moment, capturing the youth of 1964 with the very individual Beatles seen up close and surrounded them with some perfect British players like Anna Quayle, Norman Rossington and the marvellous Brambell and Spinetti. And then there are the songs - like early pop videos with that gleaming black and white photography. 

The Beatles 8 days a week

OMG, I just checked out of interest and my perfect condition 1964 Beatles Calendar is on sale on ebay for £92.99 ! I have had mine since '64, when I was 18 and a total Beatle nut. I was living in Ireland till then and I was told I was the first Beatle look-alike in North Kerry! - as per below. I even got my friend Mike to send me over a pair of those Beatle Chelsea Boots.

I also have, also from 1964 - when I was 18 and new in London - a Beatles headscarf, with images and facsimile autographs of The Fabs on it. Maybe thats worth a bit now too - there is a sold out one on ebay. The calendar has those great shots by Robert Freeman, who shot their early album covers, and the images seem unique to this calendar. I am open to offers .... 

The Beatles are now back again in Ron Howard's documentary on their touring years, EIGHT DAYS A WEEK, we will have to go and see it, a lot of that footage, particularly their American tours, will be new to me, as I did not watch television back then, in my London bedsit. Sniff .... thats why much as we loved A HARD DAY'S NIGHT it was utterly fabulous to go and see them on the big screen in colour in HELP! in 1965 - I sat through it twice at the Odeon Harlesden in North London, in those days of continuous performances. 

Now for EIGHT DAYS A WEEK ...  as they said on morning television here earlier, 52 years later and we are still talking about and listening to The Beatles. Good to see Paul and Ringo on the blue carpet at last night's premiere but we know they are 74 and 76, they don't need to dye their hair and beard. We have moved beyond "When I'm 64"!

An Olly double bill: The System / The Triple Echo

Back to 1964 and 1972 for these interesting Oliver Reed films, from that time when the British film industry was thriving ... This is my 2008 IMDB review of THE SYSTEM (now getting screenings on UK tv):

"A blast from the past for those young in the early 60s is the belated DVD release of THE SYSTEM (US Title: THE GIRL-GETTERS) made in 63 and released in 64 - when I saw it aged 18 when it would have played here in the UK for a week on release as part of a double bill and then promptly vanished without trace until I saw the DVD yesterday. It comes with a nice 8 page booklet too setting the film in context which is a model of its kind, if only more DVD re-issues followed suit! (The Best of British Collection: "films that entertained the post-war generation"). Its the kind of movie that talks to you if you are the age of the characters on screen ...

The film directed by Michael Winner with marvellous black and white photography by Nicholas Roeg (and a title song by The Searchers!) is set in one of those English seaside towns (Torbay and Brixham in Devon) following a gang of young men, led by the then very charismatic Oliver Reed, and their amorous pursuits over the summer and is actually a perfect compendium of European cinema trends of the time - there are Antonioniish moments (the tennis game here has a real ball) and it ends like LA DOLCE VITA in a Felliniesque dawn at the beach as the disillusioned characters realise the summer is over. Fellini's I VITELLONI is also a reference here. The script by Peter Draper anticipates elements of DARLING and BLOW-UP (particularly that long scene with Reed and Merrow at his apartment, and yes, her blown-up photos are pinned to the walls too - he too is a photographer becoming disillusioned with it all). 

It sports a great cast of English young players of the time (Barbara Ferris, Julia Foster, Ann Lynn, John Alderton) as well as reliables like Harry Andrews. Of the young cast David Hemmings (rather in the background here) would two years later personify the 60s when chosen by Antonioni for his lead in BLOW-UP. Jane Merrow (Hemmings' girlfriend of the time, and a replacement for Julie Christie who was doing BILLY LIAR) is perfect as Nicola the cool rich girl whom Reed falls for but she plays the game better than he does and is in complete command of any romance, as he realises she was just toying with him for the summer, so its payback time for all the 'birds' he discarded. (I got to meet her myself and had a nice long conversation with her when she was doing a play in 1966, while David was off filming BLOW-UP; she also co-starred in another favourite THE LION N WINTER in '68).

Winner of course may be a figure of fun now [he died in 2013], one forgets that in the '60s before those DEATH WISHES etc his films caught the moment as well as any by Richard Lester (THE SYSTEM could be Winner's THE KNACK), Losey, Schlesinger or the underrated Clive Donner, with titles like THE JOKERS and I'LL NEVER FORGET WHATS'ISNAME where Reed was meant to be his character from THE SYSTEM five years later.

In all its a perfect early '60s movie full of sounds and faces and the mood of that time just as the Swinging Era was taking off. For anyone interested in English cinema or remembers the era, its a real pleasure to see again 50+ years later !"

THE TRIPLE ECHO is perfectly 1972 too, though set in wartime England in the early Forties, and Glenda gets that 1940s look perfectly right with her swagger coats and perms. This is from a H E Bates story and is a perfect little British film of its era, as directed by Michael Apted. 
Brian Deacon is good too as the soldier who deserts to stay with Glenda on her remote farm, after fixing her tractor, and who disguises himself as her 'sister' and finds he likes it as he makes the mistake of leading on Olly's brute of an army officer .... as per my review, Glenda/Reed labels. Good to see it on television again too. They tried to jazz it up for America titling it SOLDIER IN SKIRTS with a lurid poster, but it is so much better than that. 

Very 1964

Here's a fascinating group photograph from that wonderful month, April 1964 - when 18 year old me arrived in London. I do not know who took this shot (or is it a compilation of several pictures?) but it was at The Empire Pool, Wembley in North London. It seems all the pop stars of the time are here, apart from The Beatles who were off conquering America.

You can though see The Rolling Stones (including Brian Jones),The Searchers, Billy J Kramer, Freddie and his Dreamers, Paul Jones and Manfred Mann, Kenny Lynch, The Merseybeats and The Fourmost, plus Cilla Black (black leather coats were all the rage then for guys and gals) and Kathy Kirby and Cathy McGowan of READY STEADY GO where the weekends began!

Other 60s groups like The Yardbirds or The Moody Blues or The Kinks or Herman's Hermits, and The Who are not included, nor The Animals or Gerry and the Pacemakers or even The Dave Clark Five! but hey, not every group was there that day,  nor young Marianne Faithfull or Sandie Shaw! or Dusty ...

But this was the 1964 look, most groups wore jackets and ties - it was not until 1967 or so that the hippie look took off and lots more hair and moustaches and psychedelic clothes.

One sad note - quite a few of these here are no longer with us - but at that moment they were part of a golden age of British pop stars, mainly from the (Stones excepted) squaresville end of pop. The big music movie hit that year was of course The Beatles in Richard Lester's A HARD DAY'S NIGHT (The Beatles label).

One has to think back to what life was like in 1964 - no wonder young people were joining groups and making music. There were just two television channels, the BBC and commercial ITV, in black and white, geared to the family audience (READY STEADY GO on Fridays was about the only pop programme then catering for the teen crowd) and they closed down at night early, movies could not be shown on TV until they were 5 years old, if you wanted big screens and colour you went to the cinema. (The Third channel BBC2 and colour came in later in the Sixties, which were Swinging by then...) and in that pre-computer world typing on manual typewriters in the typing pool was normal and factory jobs were still plentiful.