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

There was audio but what footage is there of the Beatles is there with Pete Best?

If there was known to be some what you say would make sense.

But since there isn't any it's not really an issue, is it?

 

According to whose rules?

Again, this is a film not a book so, obviously, it's constrained by what's available.

 

It's silent (the music here is dubbed over it), and you don't actually see Pete, but this bit of colour film is from a February 1962 gig:

 

I know you're talking theoretically but if this existed: "a grainy, black and white silent film of the Beatles backing Johnny Gentle," don't you think they would make a big hoohaa about it and put it in the film?

 

Yes, I have seen that before on the web.

Maybe it will be in the film, although I doubt it.

But would Pete Best get royalties for that since we don't actually get to see him?

The point is it's not as if they're sitting on a big vault of Best-era footage and excluding it as an act of censorship.

 

Well, there's the floral hall clip (which admittedly you can't see him in! But it's still footage from that era).

But it's not like the fact that footage doesn't exist of an event or era means it can't be covered - Unless something new has been discovered, there is not a scrap of footage of the Beatles in the studio in 1965 -66, and yet the new expanded remit of the film will apparently cover their studio work of this time. So you're gonna get 2016 Paul and Ringo chuntering away over still photos, or present day footage of Abbey Road. No reason in theory you couldn't have 2016 Pete and Paul chuntering away over 1960 - 62 Live Photos (and that way you might actually have the chance of hearing a story you haven't already heard 1,0000000000000 times!).

 

They probably would - however it would probably be given short shrift in a preface to the main part of the film. I can imagine film like that playing with Paul speaking over it saying something like 'we played all the clubs, you know.... we were a great little rock band... but now we were ready for the big time'... Cut to 1962.

 

When was this announced?:

"and yet the new expanded remit of the film will apparently cover their studio work of this time."

 

Well admittedly they haven't explicitly mentioned studio work, but the remit of the film has expanded beyond focusing just on live shows to the bands complete existence during the 62-66 timeframe, of which the studio work was a notable part. With a press release quote like:

'It will explore their inner workings – how they made decisions, created their music and built their collective career together – all the while, exploring The Beatles’ extraordinary and unique musical gifts and their remarkable, complementary personalities.'

..it's not too much of an inference to assume their studio work of the period will be covered. But I guess we'll see.

 

I think this is quite new.

 

....it's getting less and less focused and less and less enticing with every new bit of information that drops....

 

If it's on 'the touring years,' then I don't think there's anything wrong in featuring more than the tours as such. The intensity of the period, I'd say, would be the legitimate focus, showing what the impact of that had on the recording and relationships as well as the concerts and travelling. As for all the other presumptuous gripes, I do think some of that is rooted in the strange contradiction at the heart of contemporary fandom, wherein people feel they know everything about a subject, but then get really angry when a book or documentary doesn't tell them anything, or much, they think of as new. It's why the likes of Ron Howard, and Phillip Norman, simply cannot allow themselves to think much about such fans, because to do so would either make them give up or produce something so nerdy that it alienates the casual viewer/reader who doesn't know much at all about the subject.

 

Is it too much too expect some interesting live footage with original sound in a film about the Beatles touring years?

That's what fans will complain about if, and as of now it's only if, the documentary fails to provide that.

As for the written word, why bother with Phillip Norman when you've got Lewisohn?

 

Why not just wait and see? Why do these forums always begin with someone anticipating what they won't like and then it gets worse and worse, with the contemplation of technical sonic and filmic horrors, and a general dread of things that might attract the newcomer but bore those experts already suffering from the ennui that comes from their own personal Owl of Minerva stretching its wings long before the arrival of dusk? The switch from excitement to fierce anger is always so predictably swift.

 

I don't care much about the movie, will probably watch it once or twice. What i care about is how a possible soundtrack album will be like, because that i will probably be listening to many times.

 

I don't care much about the movie, will probably watch it once or twice. What i care about is how a possible soundtrack album will be like, because that i will probably be listening to many times.

 

Did you read beyond the first sentence?

This was the second one:

"That's what fans will complain about if, and as of now it's only if, the documentary fails to provide that."

Ok?

 

Did you read beyond the first sentence?

This was the second one:

"That's what fans will complain about if, and as of now it's only if, the documentary fails to provide that."

Ok?

 

Yeah, this trailer is a little disappointing. Nothing we haven't already seen or heard. Shea Stadium and Ed Sullivan for the dozenth time.

 

Thanks for your concern, Glenn, but I'll be fine -- as we all will. Whatever this film/project will be, it will be -- I'll get what I can out of it and move on to other things. Life is too short (and getting shorter for all of us every day) to go crazy over this stuff. I hope the film is entertaining, and not just a rehash of the "Beatlemania" episode of the Anthology -- and I hope it leads to a larger tie-in that includes (at the very least) a complete Shea video and a Hollywood Bowl CD. But if it doesn't, it doesn't.

 

Thank you master:

 

But for me personally, this is my favorite quote from the Maharishi:

 

Not if the film is covering only 1962-1966 , which is the only era covered in the film .

 

By the way, is Johnny Gentle still alive?

Johnny Gentle: "Yep, grandkiddees and great-grandkiddees, The Beatles used to back me up when I was young"...

Grandkids in unison: "Keep dreaming Grandpa...".

 

Well if that footage existed I think they might be tempted to expand the parameters, don't you think?