I confess that I am a raging Beatles fan. My greatest joy is that they got me playing the guitar at age 10 back in 1967. My biggest disappointment is that my mother put my brother and me to bed right when the Beatles showed up on the Ed Sullivan Show and then told us all about it the next day.
So, when I turn on “A Hard Day's Night,” hear that opening chord (is that a G7add9sus4 or a Dm7sus4? Who knows?) and watch John, Paul George and Ringo running down the street towards us, my heart leaps. I see John Lennon with a huge smile on his face and I tear up.
Andrew Sarris of the Village Voice described the movie as the “Citizen Kane” of Jukebox musicals. It is the antithesis of an Elvis movie. It abandons all of those Hollywood musical clichés and ushered in a new era of British Films founded on the French New Wave and Black and White cinema verité. It is irreverent, absurdist, and surreal. It turns British culture on its head with its mocking of British posh culture harkening back to the popular Spike Milligan and the Goon show and celebrating the Beatles Scouse accents and Liverpool background, an interesting turn considering that both Richard Lester, the director, and Walter Shenson, the producer, were expatriate Americans living and working in England before making the movie.
The writer, Alun Owen, was a Welsh playwright who had collaborated with Lester on his English TV show back in 1955 and was known to the Beatles, having written a play about Liverpool in 1959, “No Trams to Lime Street.” The Cinematographer, Gilbert Taylor, had previously filmed “Dr. Strangelove” for Stanley Kubrick, another expatriate American living in England.
The film is also a compendium of rising film actors who continued working in British films and music for decades. Short glimpses can be had of stars such as Jacqueline Bisset and Phil Collins. Hard-core Beatles fans will appreciate the Hitchcockian cameo of The Beatles' trusted assistant, Mal Evans, walking with a bass case between John Lennon and actor Anna Quayle in their memorable scene together in an echo of Hitchcock's cameo in "Strangers on a Train."
Some commentators point to this movie as the spark that ignited the “Swinging 60s” (one makes the point that, at the time, the “Swinging 60s” really only constituted about 800 people living in the London district of Chelsea).
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the movie’s opening, which was first released on July 10, 1964. Its popularity was enormous. At one point there were 1,600 prints of the film in simultaneous circulation.
I entice you to explore some of the many recent podcasts that go into depth about the making, influences and legacy of the movie. The Criterion Collection also provides a screening with a commentary track provided by many of the actors and production people involved that is well worth watching.
I will also say that there is nothing better than watching this movie on the big screen for the full immersive experience. Oh, and then there is the music. Bring your incense and prayer beads.
