Taking Eight Days a
Week: The Touring Years on its own merits probably won’t alter that initial
assumption much.
Despite its near improbable subtitle The Band You Know. The Story You Don’t. there is basically nothing
in this movie that will be new to even the most casual fan. There isn’t even
much story here. Howard assembles his film in chaotic fashion, with the band
(Paul and Ringo in recent footage; John and George in vintage, obviously),
their coworkers (George Martin, Neil Aspinall, journalist and biographer Larry
Kane), and fans (Whoopie Goldberg, Elvis Costello, Sigourney Weaver) providing
scattershot impressions of the usual subtopics: America, Beatlemaniacs, Brian
Epstein, filmmaking, friendship, songwriting, recording, Shea Stadium, “bigger
than Jesus,” etc. The footage is often familiar too, though one clip of a huge
crowd of Liverpudlian football fans, who look like they could take a kick to the
teeth as well as they could dish one out, all singing “She Loves You” was new to
me and utterly delightful.
The information is so basic that I can only assume that
Howard intended his film to be a primer for potential new fans, though I really
wonder how much this material will move fans of contemporary pop. I hope it
will move them, because the one major merit of Howard’s film is it gives a very
clear sense of the hope and joy The Beatles brought to the world in their time.
And if there is one thing our world can really use right now is hope and joy.
Also of contemporary value is the extended focus on The Beatles’ rejection of
segregation at their shows, their refusal to treat fans of any color or culture
differently than anyone else. That kind of understanding, that clear idea of
what is fundamentally right and what is fundamentally wrong is something else
the world really, really needs right now.
Apple/UMe’s new blu-ray of Eight
Days a Week: The Touring Years arrives with a bonus disc with another
feature film’s worth of supplements. There are
clips of performances of five songs. Featurettes expand on the feature’s
discussions of the Lennon/McCartney partnership, the way The Beatles revolutionized
music and culture, Shea Stadium, A Hard
Day’s Night, and their visits to Australia and Japan won’t enlighten
long-term fans much more than the proper film will, though there are some interesting sideroads, such as Peter Asher’s discussion of his Peter and Gordon getting in on the Lennon/McCartney goldmine, Tony Bennett’s son’s recollections of seeing The Beatles at Shea, and Ronnie Spector’s memories of meeting the guys she classified as "four foxes" and going shopping with them on Carnaby Street.
