Magical Mystery Tour - When Was This On TV?*

I think it was on PBS or MTV in the 1980s, around the time that the CDs came out. I'm leaning more toward PBS but I can't recall exactly. It was alright. The comic book story and colorful wacky pictures in the MMT booklet give the suggestion of a film that is far funnier than what it turned out to be, though.

 

Boxing Day, 1967 in glorious black and white, a visiting aunt nearly fainted at the line about "...you let your knickers down...".

 

Us younger folks, first had our chance to see it on a really bad copy of vhs or beta cassettes. I picked mine up along with Shea and the Washington concert for $5 each from a drug store. The quality was crappy, which didn’t help the MMT experience at all. But, we saw it, shook our heads and moved onward.

 

It was on tv in the uk near Christmas one year in the eighties. My tv started smoking half way through. Wasn’t very happy.

 

My mom took me to see it when I was four or five in the mid 70s at the University of Texas - Arlington campus. It was shown as a double feature with a documentary on the Beatles. I remembered enjoying it quite a bit, so in the early 80s, I was saving my allowances to buy the VHS version that Meda/Media put out in 1981. I never saved enough for it, but I saw it again in the mid 80s when Night Flight aired it, and realized most of my memories were of the documentary they played before MMT.

 

Great film!

 

Like you, I saw it on the 26th, and of course it was in black and white. (Your parents might have been even more speechless if they’d seen it in colour on BBC2 the day before.)

I also taped the soundtrack on my new Ultra/Ferguson reel-to-reel tape recorder I’d just had for Christmas. I already had the EP, so the bit I played the most was Death Cab For Cutie by the Bonzos. Without the visuals, of course...

 

Seem to remember it being shown on VH1 on Halloween (?) somewhere around 2000? That was the first time I saw it in full.

 

I saw it in a movie theater with two of my friends somewhere around 1975. Skipped Hebrew School for it

 

These are the members of the Airplane!

 

The film is worth it if only for the Bonzos.

 

I remember watching in on black & white TV when it was first broadcast in Britain. It was fun but the general consensus was that it was pretty dull and disappointing. Its bizarre, surreal aspect wasn't a shock though as there was a lot of that about at the time (Jonathan Miller's "Alice In Wonderland", The Prisoner, The Goons,...).
I love to watch it from time to time.

 

I just discovered Alice In Wonderland after all these years. Worth seeing.

 

50 years old. I have never seen it. I kind of want to even though everything I have read says it isn't great.

 

No, December 1967 or January 1968.

That year was 1979!

A week later, on BBC2 in colour, January 5th 1968.

 

The 1966 one with music by Ravi Shankar? Saw it in 1966 and have the DVD which is on my 'to watch' list.

 

Can you take me back...Can you take me back.

 

I remember seeing the movie as a kid for the first time on TV here in Canada probably in the late 70's or early 80's. I recall it was during the holiday season - maybe Boxing day or New Year's Eve and that I was left very disappointed. I didn't know what to make of it. It was the most bizarre thing I had ever seen. I don't watch it very often but I can sit through the entire thing without issue. The blu-ray looks and sounds great!

 

Thanks for the info .

 

Yep, that one.

 

I made the perfect Christmas time TV treat by editing up Magical Mystery Tour like this:
1. Shortened the movie to 30 minutes by editing out a lot of the stuff that went on too long, dragged a bit, or didn't involve The Beatles themselves much.
2. Added some of the off-cuts like Traffic and The Beatles eating fish and chips and other brief funny bits featuring the Beatles.
3. Added Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields and A Day in The Life videos in appropriate spots.
4. Added the 'twisting' Hello Goodbye video at the end between Your Mother Should Know and the Hello Goodbye coda of everyone running out.
5. Enjoyed a 50 minute film that is much more watchable and I think would not have alienated the critics who hated it so much at the time- unlike the general public who were mainly either rather enchanted or a bit bored.

 

Does anybody remember it watching it in black and white?

 

Of course! Oops.

 

In Philly WXPN hosted the first area showing of it on November 23, 1968 at the Irvine Auditorium; it was competing with Yellow Submarine which was in wide release at the time.

 

Of course. Only a few thousand people had colour TV in the UK in 1967. The 11 million who watched it on BBC1 saw it in black and white, me included. It was thrilling to see The Beatles again.