"Only Victor Mature's hairdresser knows for sure" - 50th Anniversary of HEAD

This month marks the 50th anniversary of The Monkees' film Head.



So, when and where did you first see the movie?
What did you think?
Has this opinion changed?
Do you own it on a home media format?

 

Head.
Head.
Head.
Head.
Head.

 

The most innovative Hollywood film of the '60s

 

I think I first saw it sometime in the early 1990s. Probably around the time the first batch of CD reissues came from Rhino. Big big fan of the album, and I think some of the band's best songs are there -- Circle Sky, The Porpoise Song, Can You Dig It?, and so on.

I do own it on DVD; the first Rhino Entertainment pan-and-scan release from 1995. I should pick up that Criterion reissue.

And the same goes for Christmas!

 

old theatre and vhs tape in 80's

​

 

I thought it was kinda stupid and self-indulgent the first time I saw it (panned and scanned Columbia VHS whenever that came out). Of course, I still think that but those are only two of the many reasons why I love it now. I own the Criterion blu-ray from the amazing BBS box (it really deserves a stand-alone release). One of the rare movies that I like more each time I see it.

 

You may not believe this but this movie was my introduction to The Pre-fab Four.

I caught a good chunk of it on AMC way back when and thought "da funk is this? Wait, that's Davy Jones so this must be The Monkees." I'd like to say this started a interest...well, not for another ten years, at least but then I was an ungrateful you know what back in the day.

Anyway, HEAD; the movie Columbia was expecting predates the show, John Boorman's Catch Us if You Can/Having a Wild Weekend. What they got was surrealist spin through various movie genres and some of The Monkees best songs (especially Peter's tunes), all dressed in the psychedelia of the day. A movie that only could've been made during the rise of New Hollywood.

Is there an odor of something that's not one of your standard brands? Yes.
Does it fall apart into slapstick mayhem at the end? Yes.
Is this the end of The Monkees? It's the living end and the joint is really going to rock tonight.

Regrettably I traded in my copy of the Rhino DVD when the BluRay set was announced. (Two years later and I still have yet to buy it.)

 

Groovy idea for another Monkees' thread.

A friend of the family had taped it for me from cable back in the late 80s while I was a teen. I eagerly looked for Head in the weekly TV listings that came with the newspaper for many months. As I recall, the movie was not shown much at the time even after the '86 reunion and Monkees show reruns. I had The Monkees Tale and Monkeemania books, so I knew about the movie from those sources. The movie to me was quite dark and weird. I really liked the soundtrack and already knew the songs, but the movie was just out there for me. I did watch it repeatedly.

Overall I like the movie, and my opinion has not much changed on it. It's still "dark and weird." I do watch it from time to time, but not that often. I now have a copy of it from the BBS box.

 

Now, that is definitely odd. First learning about the Monkees through seeing Head is definitely weird given that the TV series was on much more often long ago than the movie itself was.

 

I first saw it around 1973-74 on late night TV after a heavy bout of teenage partying.
I was surprised at how much I liked it, as The Monkees were the pinnacle of uncoolness in the mid-70's.

 

Interesting to note that John Boorman movie, I'd like to catch this movie sometime. I don't have cable, so I may watch it some other time later.

I watched low budget hippie movie Psych-Out (1967) somewhat recently with Jack Nicholson as the main actor. It was an interesting movie overall, but definitely dated for its time. And I'd like to note it was rather groovy that the Seeds were in it.

Head definitely was a movie for the stoners. It's just that I could see the stoners in 1968 not wanting to watch a flick starring the Monkees in it. Head was definitely marketing in a wrong direction, hence its box office failure.

 

It is beyond a crime that this site went stale 5 years ago now......it was (and still technically is) the greatest in depth look at the movie and it sadly remains unfinished:

SOTCAA: Edit News: The Monkees - Head

 

While I had a vague awareness of The Monkees prior to 1986, it was that comeback that turned me into a fan. I’d heard a bunch about HEAD, and was intrigued enough to by the soundtrack (on cassette). LOVED the music on it, and delightfully puzzled by the bits of dialogue and sounds from the film.

Anyhow, that fall a nearby university (I was a senior in high school) did a midnight screening of the film. The theatre was packed, and I was blown away by the film. Never saw anything like it before.

This wasn’t some cuddly Beatles film, nor was it anything like The Monkees TV show. More along the lines of the madness of Tommy or The Wall — and I mean that in a GOOD way! Wished I’d gotten really baked beforehand too (Once the movie came out on VHS, my friends and I did that plenty)!

Saw it again on a big screen the following summer, when a local arthouse theatre played it on a double bill with A Hard Day’s Night (Yeah, we got baked for that too). Good times, truly.

Any chance to watch it, I would. I remember HBO showing it in the late 80s, and TNT showing it in prime time too. TCM shows it at least a couple times a year. Bought the “America: Lost and Found” DVD box set from Criterion several years back, mostly just for HEAD but there are other excellent films in that same set. Then I picked up The Monkees blu-ray box set as a Black Friday deal last year.

Anyhow, while I like The Monkees in general, I think HEAD is by far the best thing they ever did, both the film and the soundtrack. I probably only watch it 2-3 times a year now, but I never tire of it. If anything, my fondness for it has grown, and now and then I see things in the movie I never did before. If the footage still exists, I’d love to see the original, longer version that got cut prior to its release.

As much as I like the Beatles films, The Grateful Dead movie, The Last Waltz, The Wall, Spinal Tap, I’m Not There and others, HEAD is my favorite music movie. One of my favorite films, period. Not for everyone, but highly underrated.

 

Damn right.

 

The same place I saw it, The CBS Late Movie IIRC

No surprise for me as I've always loved the TV show.

But along those same lines, that was the same year/time slot that I saw Jailhouse Rock, and understood how that guy in the Vegas leisure suit had been cool once.

All in all, a very significant few months in my musical evolution.

 

I have two favorite films.

Over the years I can watch them again and again.

Roger & Me

Head

 

I really like Roger & Me as well. I finally saw it about 10 years after its release. I do recall the controversy it stirred after its initial release. Off-topic .....

Back to Head.

I hope we get more Monkees fans to share their stories about this enigmatic film.

Did anyone read Peter Mills' book on Head? The Monkees, Head, and the 60s

 

Great book, really goes into the themes of the movie, definitely worth reading.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1908279974/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1542735682&sr=8-1

 

It would've been nice if the TV special 33 1/3 Revolutions per Monkee had been included with it.

 

The special is available on the original dvd set and the Blu-ray set, the dvd has the complete version of the special while the Blu-ray has a edited, abbreviated version of one of the Jerry Lee Lewis songs, ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’” due to refusal from the copyright holders.

 

Yes.

 

I first seen the film after renting it at the video store (probably around '88)... Liked it upon the first viewing, though it wasn't the Monkees as seen on their TV series... Having never seen/heard the live version of "Circle Sky" at that point, I was blown away by it and rewound and rewound the tape over and over to watch that... Soon afterward, I ending up buying the tape from the same store I initially rented it from (and that store was a store called "Pages at the Movies", where they sold old books and rented <and sold> videos).

Anyway, my opinion hasn't changed, if anything I like it more now than I did 30 years ago... I own the pan and scan DVD from Rhino.

 

Yeah, I should've been a little clearer; I have the Blu-ray and there's just that one little bit from the special. One of those times when I should've bought the DVD instead of the blu-ray!

 

Let's clarify something; Rhino's DVD is open matte (you can tell because the mattes are visible during both versions of "Porpoise Song"), not pan and scan.

 

I saw it in the 90's. No desire to see it ever again.
I'm glad I did see it so I could get to hear As We Go Along and Porpoise Song.
And I had heard that the studio Circle Sky was crap compared to the movie. That alone justified sitting through the movie. Well, that and Frank and his friend.