Review: 'Beatles '64' shows an unguarded band stepping into America's limelight
It’s often claimed, I’m not sure on what authority, that the Beatles’ arrival in America, three months after the assassination of President Kennedy, in some unquantifiable way lifted the spirits of a depressed nation, allowing it to move forward into the light. Perhaps reliving it in 2024 will bring similar relief, though of course, some will just long for the past.
It’s a thought repeated by Paul McCartney himself in a delightful new-old documentary “Beatles ’64,” premiering Friday on Disney+, in what, after “The Beatles Anthology” in 1995 and “Get Back” in 2019, might be seen as an infrequent Thanksgiving tradition. The film, produced by Martin Scorsese and directed by David Tedeschi, is the latest repurposing of footage shot by Albert and David Maysles, when the band crossed the pond to appear on “The Ed Sullivan Show” in February 1964.
The Maysles’ footage was originally used for the BBC documentary “What’s Happening! The Beatles in the U.S.A.,” and formed the substance of the 1991 “The Beatles: The First U.S. Visit.” (Bits and pieces have appeared in various Beatles docs over the years; it is foundational stuff.) But there is more of it here, interspersed with new interviews with McCartney, Ringo Starr and fans and friends who participated in the moment, along with archival interviews with George Harrison and John Lennon and some needless social context from Marshall McLuhan and Betty Friedan. Happily absent are later-generation pop stars testifying to the band’s genius, or worse, singing their own versions of Beatles songs. Not even the Beatles testify to their own genius.
“You must be kidding with that question,” says McCartney, when a reporter asks about their place in “Western culture.” “It’s not culture, it’s a good laugh.”
Source: Robert Lloyd/latimes.com
