Ron Howard's Beatles Documentary Feature Film About The Band's Touring Years, "Eight Days a Week"*

Is it me, or in the official trailer is Paul finally showing his age? There's just a brief glimpse of him talking, but his eyes look sunken and his face (finally) is starting to look old. I'm not knocking him -- he has lived 30 lives in the space of one - but it was a little unsettling to see him looking a bit... frail? I need to look at some clips from the most recent shows and see how he's doing.

 

Yeah, know what you mean, I still think of Paul in the Driving Rain era, the one time I saw him live, but hell he was a youthful 59-60. Hard to believe that was fifteen years ago already.

 

Great! Maybe if there is bonus footage my dream of getting Charo's and Regis Philbin's impressions of never seeing the Beatles live in concert will be included, seeing that the film seems to have veered away from the original, tired old touring years concept.

By the way, I have an inside source at Vee-Jay that told me the next film, The Beatles-The Studio Years is already in pre- production. Unfortunately there is precious little film of the Beatles in the studio during the "studio years ", so because the Beatles own the old Beatles cartoon series, the film will be fleshed out with two hours of the old cartoons but with most original songs replaced with "studio years" songs. The project director is Walter Lantz Jr.

Even though the "new" songs won't sync exactly with the old cartoons, I have been told that the snippet my source saw of the "What's the New Mary Jane" studio track replacing "Boys" from the original cartoon is in his words... "Simply stunning."

 

I think you're being facetious.

 

I'm waiting for the Rob Reiner directed documentary "Brian Epstein- sitting at the table during Beatle interviews".

 

So the blu Ray version will be the same as the theatrical release. Or, extra stuff inc on Bd?

 

Geez Frank, I can never fool you.

 

There's an interview in the latest Empire magazine where Howard admits he was never a fanatical Beatles fan; didn't buy all the albums etc, and he says sometimes that's good because, to paraphrase, you're approaching the project as an outsider rather than a Beatles obsessive and gain perspective that way.

 

A labour of love, ( me do) then....not.

 

How can we be excited about this movie (outside of them tossing us Shea beforehand as a bone) is beyond me. Still, the audio product (sans the hideous cover) will be awesome to finally have in remixed glory.

 

I'd hate to watch it and then report on it.

 

So for theatrical purposes this will be like a condensed Anthology TV series with 30 minute uncut concert footage? Audience target?

 

The same source knows for a fact that they are going to animate the song "Blackbird" with the following cartoon:

 

Well, given what we've read about how and especially why and by whose hand the film has changed direction, it appears the target audience and purpose of the film is simply to please Messrs McCartney and Starr, and Ms. Ono and Ms. Harrison.

 

Errrr yes. My band would certainly never release something that didn't please me or the other members.

 

The question was who was the intended audience.
The answer is apparently that this is a vanity project for the four Apple board members.

 

Yes. Most releases are vanity projects for the involved artists.

 

67 second clip.
59 seconds of a talking head
8 seconds of live Beatles'...audio (NO video)

not a good sign

 

Extrapolating:
The clip: 8 seconds out of 67 seconds = 12%
The movie: 100 minutes x .12 = 12 minutes of live Beatles?

 

Are you ready?!!! Are you ready for it?!!!


We're only two weeks away from seeing and hearing an endless parade of irrelevant, clueless outsiders spouting nonsense about the epic saga of the lads from Liddypool!



Brace yourself. And be expecting it because I imagine the narrative will go something like this:


Civil rights movement invented by The Beatles...even while Paul rips off R&B/Soul shouters, yet still manages to pass the freedom torch to Whoopi & Malcolm X John, accepted as a charming heretic in the hearts of all Bible Belch KKK'ers who then plan vinyl BBQs to celebrate "Cold Turkey" reaching No.1 Imelda Marcos's shoes stepped on by a barefoot, non-pregnant Ringo, with talon-like toenails George, strung-out on sitar addiction, forces the group to quit touring so that John can go home & be available to have an affair with Yoko



Haven't we heard all of this before?

Did they get it right? Were they even close?

OK, nevermind.



In the interest of full disclosure, I'm still going to the theater to see this movie.


And I am excited to check it out.....for the brief snippets of live roarin' Rock footage contained therein.



But, truth be told, the screening of the complete Shea '65 concert (after the projection of the feature film) --- on the BIG screen --- remains the most compelling aspect of the upcoming event.

 

Maybe some potential live footage from the film will leak out at some time. Some of it could have been recently digitized for the first time. One can hope...

 

Well, I bought my tickets a couple of weeks ago for the screening here in Asheville and have admittedly become less enthused about actually seeing the film than I first was! I also hope to take the "keep an open mind" approach but as many have already said, it's impossible not to feel that a *massive* opportunity was missed with this.

All that said, I will be in my seat on the 15th and will no doubt be smiling my head off between any potential eye-rolling. I just wish my anticipation for it was as great as for the Nick Cave screening the week prior because it really should be!

 

Me too Connie! I saw AHDN and Help, and LIB on day one in my hometown, the saga continues! Not expecting to be blown away, but I get to see those guys on a big screen, probably the best quality Shea ever, and maybe a glimpse or two of some new stuff. I've done worse for $8.

 

It's $12.50 here! And I thought things are supposed to be less expensive here in the sticks...thanks a lot, Forthlin!

[joking! can't access smilies through the phone...]

 

Exactly . BSB ( Big Screen Beatles ) is always a fun thing in my book .
There's got to be $8 worth of cool in this movie, crammed in somewhere between the TTH. (Towering Talking Heads )