A Hard Day's Night (film)

A Hard Day's Night
Directed by	Richard Lester
Written by	Alun Owen
Produced by	Walter Shenson
Starring	John Lennon Paul McCartney George Harrison Ringo Starr
Cinematography	Gilbert Taylor
Music by	John Lennon & Paul McCartney George Harrison ("Don't Bother Me") George Martin (incidental music) (uncredited)
Distributed by	United Artists
Release dates	July 6, 1964 (UK release) August 11 1964 (US release)
Running time	87 min.
Language	English

A Hard Day's Night (1964) is a British comedy film originally released by United Artists, written by Alun Owen and starring The Beatles during the height of Beatlemania. The director was Richard Lester, the producer Walter Shenson and the director of photography Gilbert Taylor. The main camera operator was Derek Browne.Other operators were Paul Wilson, Jack Atchellor, Val Stewart and Austin Dempster. Gil Taylor and Derek Browne were the only two camera people credited.Focus pullers (men that focused the camera)were Freddie Cooper and Roy Ford. In addition to the Beatles, cast members included Wilfrid Brambell as Paul's grandfather, who was billed as "also starring" after the main title, Norman Rossington as their manager, John Junkin as "Shake," Lionel Blair as a featured dancer, Victor Spinetti as the television director and in cameos David Langton, John Bluthal as a car thief and Derek Nimmo in an uncredited role as Leslie Jackson (a magician). The album A Hard Day's Night was the Beatles' first soundtrack album. The film premiered on July 6, 1964.

Background

The film was shot for United Artists using a cinéma vérité style in black and white and produced over a period of 16 weeks in the spring of 1964. Black and white was chosen for its lower cost, and the short time frame for filming was thought necessary because the studio was convinced that Beatlemania would not last beyond the summer of 1964. (Their primary interest in making the movie, in fact, was the potential sales from licensing a soundtrack album.) The film also used the innovative technique of cutting the images to the beat of the music, and because of this many see the film as playing a major role in development of modern music videos, especially the Can't Buy Me Love segment, which featured creative camera work and the band running and jumping around in a field.

The film's director, Richard Lester, subsequently directed the Beatles' 1965 film, Help!. He went on to direct several popular motion pictures of the 1970s and 1980s, including The Three Musketeers and Superman II.

Wilfrid Brambell, who played Paul McCartney's grandfather, was already well-known to British audiences as the co-star of the 1960s/1970s British TV sitcom Steptoe & Son - a show upon which the 1970s American TV sitcom Sanford & Son was based.

Plot

Screenwriter Alun Owen was chosen because the Beatles were familiar with his play No Trams to Lime Street and Owen had a knack for Liverpudlian dialogue.

The film chronicles in a mock documentary-style the Beatles arriving at a theatre, rehearsing, and finally performing in a television special. Owen spent several days with the group, who told him their lives were like "a room and a car and a room and a car and a room and car". He realized that by 1964 the Beatles were prisoners of their own fame, and their schedule of performances and studio work by that time was extremely punishing; he wrote this into the script. The character of Paul's grandfather refers to this, saying, "I was supposed to be getting a change of scenery, and so far I've been in a train and a room, and a car and a room, and a room and a room."

The film is one of the best depictions of Beatlemania. In various places, the Beatles comment cheekily on their own fame: for instance, at one point a fan recognises John Lennon as himself; he demurs, saying his face isn't quite right. The fan eventually agrees.

Reception

New York Times film critic Bosley Crowther noted the film is also a subtle satire on the image of rock-and-roll music (and the Beatles in particular) as a source of youth rebellion and defiance of authority. In the film, the Beatles are portrayed as likeable young lads who are constantly amazed at the attention they receive and who want nothing more than run around and have a good time; however, they have to deal with screaming crowds, journalists who ask nonsense questions, and authority figures who constantly look down upon them. The biggest troublemaker in the film is an elderly senior citizen, Paul McCartney's "clean" grandfather (played by Wilfrid Brambell).

According to Roy Carr’s Beatles at the Movies, most reviews were largely positive. One oft-quoted assessment was provided by New York’s Village Voice, which labelled A Hard Day’s Night “the Citizen Kane of juke box musicals.” Time Magazine also called the film “One of the smoothest, freshest, funniest films ever made for purposes of exploitation.”

After six weeks the film had grossed $5.8 million in rentals. In fact, before the film’s official release, advance sales of the print and accompanying soundtrack had already more than recouped the £200,000 budget.

Numerous musicians have credited the film with inspiring their permanent dedication to the world of rock-and-roll. David Crosby admits, “I came out [of the theater] and swung around a post arm’s length going ‘Yes!’ I went into that movie and came out knowing what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.” A similar impact was to be had many years later on the Ramones. In the United States, the film’s visuals and storyline are credited with inspiring a television series based around the prefab four, the Monkees.

Film critic Roger Ebert cites the film as one of the "Top Films of All Time".

In 2004 the magazine Total Film named A Hard Day's Night the 42nd greatest British film of all time. In 2005, Time.com named it one of the 100 best films of the last 80 years.

It is currently ranked the fourth greatest film of all time on Rotten Tomatoes.

Title inspired by Ringo-ism

The movie's strange title originated from something said by Ringo Starr, the Beatles' drummer. Starr described it this way in an interview with disc jockey Dave Hull in 1964: "We went to do a job, and we'd worked all day and we happened to work all night. I came up still thinking it was day I suppose, and I said, 'It's been a hard day...' and I looked around and saw it was dark so I said, '...night!' So we came to 'A Hard Day's Night.'"

According to Lennon in a 1980 interview with Playboy magazine: "I was going home in the car and Dick Lester [director of the movie] suggested the title, 'Hard Day's Night' from something Ringo had said. I had used it in 'In His Own Write' [a book Lennon was writing then], but it was an off-the-cuff remark by Ringo. You know, one of those malapropisms. A Ringo-ism, where he said it not to be funny... just said it. So Dick Lester said, 'We are going to use that title.'"

File:Harrison and boyd screenshot.PNG

A screenshot of George Harrison and Pattie Boyd on the set. They married in 1966.

In a 1994 interview for The Beatles Anthology, however, McCartney disagreed with Lennon's recollections, recalling that it was the Beatles, and not Lester, who had come up with the idea of using Starr's verbal misstep: "The title was Ringo's. We'd almost finished making the film, and this fun bit arrived that we'd not known about before, which was naming the film. So we were sitting around at Twickenham studios having a little brain-storming session... and we said, 'Well, there was something Ringo said the other day.' Ringo would do these little malapropisms, he would say things slightly wrong, like people do, but his were always wonderful, very lyrical... they were sort of magic even though he was just getting it wrong. And he said after a concert, 'Phew, it's been a hard day's night.'"

In 1996, yet another version of events appeared — In an Associated Press report, Walter Shenson, who produced the film, said that Lennon described to Shenson some of Starr's funnier gaffes, including "a hard day's night", whereupon Shenson immediately decided that that was going to be the title of the movie (the originally planned title was Beatlemania). Shenson then told Lennon that he needed a theme song for the film. That song, also titled "A Hard Day's Night", became a huge hit.

Songs in "A Hard Day's Night"

A Hard Day's Night

• "I'll Cry Instead"
• "A Hard Day's Night"
• "I Should Have Known Better"
• "Can't Buy Me Love"
• "If I Fell"
• "And I Love Her"
• "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You"
• "Ringo's Theme (This Boy)"
• "Tell Me Why"
• "Don't Bother Me" -- written by George Harrison, notwithstanding the film's closing credit "songs by John Lennon and Paul McCartney"
• "I Wanna Be Your Man"
• "All My Loving"
• "She Loves You"

"I'll Cry Instead" was intended for the film but was cut. It appeared in a prologue for a 1980s reissue by Universal Pictures. "You Can't Do That" was actually filmed as part of the concert, but was cut from the film's final version. The footage can be seen on the documentary The Making of "A Hard Day's Night".

Locations

• Marylebone station in London
• Crowcombe Heathfield station on the West Somerset Railway
• Thornbury Playing Fields, Isleworth, Middlesex, England ("Can't Buy Me Love")

Quotes

• Paul: "Oh, this to, too solid flesh would melt...ZAP!"
• Grandfather: "Congratulate me, boys! I'm engaged!"
  Paul: "Oh, no, you're not. Not this time."
• Grandfather: "I thought I was going to get a change of scenery, and so far I've been in a train and a room, and a car and a room, and a room, and a room!"
• Woman: "What a clean old man!"

Academy Awards

Award	Person
Nominated:
Best Score	George Martin
Best Screenplay	Alun Owen

Extracts from the film

The Beatles' Extracts From The Film A Hard Day's Night EP was released November 6, 1964 it consisted of :

• Side A: 1) I Should Have Known Better 2) If I Fell
• Side B: 1) Tell Me Why 2) And I Love Her

The EP was only released in mono and never released in stereo
Its catalogue number is Parlophone GEP 8920

Trivia

• One of the dancers prominently featured in the nightclub sequence was the actress Charlotte Rampling making her (uncredited) screen debut.

• The approximately 300 young fans in the audience of the fictional TV show in the film were all child actors recruited from a stage school. Among them was a child actor who later became famous as a musician - Phil Collins.

• George Harrison met his first wife Pattie Boyd on the first day of filming. She was already an established model. She had recently appeared in a TV commercial directed by Richard Lester - who cast her in the small part of a schoolgirl on the train.

• The film opened (6 July 1964) just seven years to the day (6 July 1957) on which John Lennon was first introduced to Paul McCartney in Liverpool at the Woolton Parish Church Garden Fete.

• The running joke of Wilfrid Brambell character being "a very clean old man" is in reference to his on-screen son, Harold, in Steptoe and Son constantly referring to his father as "you dirty old man!".

• During the song "If I Fell", George leans on an AMP only for it to almost topple over. It was an unscripted moment, but left in the final film.

• In the bathtub scene, the song that John hums is the German national anthem, "Das Lied der Deutschen". He is humming the famous line. "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit" which is the song's informal name.

• References to both Paul's and John's mothers were made in the film, however, both their mothers had already died in real life (Paul's in 1956 of an embolism during breast cancer surgery, and John's in 1958 after being hit by a car driven by an off-duty, drunk police officer).

• Continuity goof: After Norm tells the boys to stay in their hotel room to reply to the fan-mail then leaves, The Beatles decide to leave the room anyway. As they are seen leaving, George Harrison can be clearly seen wearing a white long-sleeved shirt and dark necktie. In the next few scenes in the nightclub and the hotel room, which take place during the same evening, George is now seen wearing a black turtle-neck sweater.

• In the hotel room scene, The Beatles are leaving to go and get Paul's grandfather from the hotel casino, after Paul says "He's probably in the middle of some orgy by now." As they prepare to leave, the hotel waiter, who is only in his under-garments, says, "Well, what about me?" John replies, "You're too old." As John exits through the door, a person's hand can be seen coming into the door frame as the door is about to close.

• The word 'Beatle' is not spoken during the film, though it does appear on Ringo's drums.

• At one point, Paul's grandfather asks George to autograph a photo of the band (in order to counterfeit it later for profit), and he complies. However, George reaches into his jacket for a pen just before Paul's grandfather asks him for said autograph. In the same scene, Paul, who is left-handed, autographs the picture with his right hand.

Release history

File:Hard Day's Night CAV Criterion.jpg

Criterion CAV Laserdisc release of A Hard Day's Night!

As previously mentioned, A Hard Day's Night was originally released by United Artists. In 1979 (15 years after its original release), the film's ownership was transferred from United Artists to its producer, Walter Shenson. In 1982, Shenson granted rights to Universal Pictures for a theatrical reissue.

Universal added a brief prologue consisting of a montage of photographic stills from the film shoot edited to a soundtrack of the song "I'll Cry Instead", a recording at one point considered for the film (and included on the US soundtrack album) but eventually not used in the film. In 1984, MPI Home Video (under license from Shenson) first released A Hard Day's Night on home video in the VHS, Betamax and Laserdisc formats.

The movie was also released by Criterion in both a single-disc CLV and a dual-disc CAV Laserdisc format. The supplemental features section on the CAV edition include the original theatrical trailer, an interview with Richard Lester and Richard Lester's Running Jumping Standing Still Film.

In 1993, Voyager Company produced a Mac format CD-Rom with most of Criterion's elements, including the original script. It was briefly issued by MPI on DVD without any additional content.

In 2000, Miramax Films reissued the film theatrically in the U.S., and on a collector's edition DVD 2 years later, as well as its final issue in the VHS format. The film had been transferred from the restored 35mm negative and presented in 1.66:1 Widescreen. (As the movie was originally filmed in Academy 1.37:1, the image was cropped slightly for the 2002 DVD release). The film's full-screen image was retained for the VHS release, however.

In addition to the original film, the DVD edition contained a bonus disc with over 7 hours of additional materials including interviews with 29 cast and crew members and Beatles associates. The DVD was produced by Beatles historian and producer Martin Lewis, a longtime friend of the film's producer Walter Shenson.

File:Hard Day's Night CAV Criterion Open.jpg

Inside of the Gatefold Cover of A Hard Day's Night! Criterion Laserdisc

40th anniversary cast and crew reunion screening

On 6 July 2004 - the 40th anniversary of the film's world premiere - a private cast and crew reunion screening was hosted in London by DVD producer Martin Lewis. The screening was attended by McCartney, actors Victor Spinetti, John Junkin, David Janson and many crew members. In media interviews at the event, McCartney disclosed that while he had seen the film many times on video, he had not seen the film on the 'big screen' since its 1964 premiere.

External links

• A Hard Day's Night at IMDb and Trivia there
• The Beatles in West Somerset
• Template:Rogerebert
• Beatles Laserdisc

Multimedia

Complete Movie