HELPed Back
The second Beatles movie, HELP!, first mentioned here nearly a year ago, is being re-re-released on DVD. The Beatles were terrorized by a fanatical eastern religion that was out for blood! I love this movie, it always makes me laugh, and I think it HELPed prime my generation for enjoying Monty Python.
John Lennon knocked HELP!, but it had much more influence on the 60’s as an era than A Hard Day’s Night. And, in fact, I think it had influence on the Beatles themselves, as seen in this video I spliced together.
“I can say no more” has been a running joke between me and D. F. Rogers for decades. Did you notice three things seen for the first time that would be seen again later?
- John’s wire-rim glasses
- Indian instruments
- The boys in Sgt. Pepper-ish garb
George Martin is also not particularly fond of HELP! because he didn’t score the incidental music. This is what Martin had to say about it in his book, All You Need Is Ears:
On the Beatle front, the next film was Help!, and that was done without my help! I produced all the Beatles recordings for it, of course, and they certainly thought I was going to do the film music; but since the director was Dick Lester again, it was hardly surprising that, to quote Sam Goldwyn, I was included out. The music was done by Ken Thorne, a buddy of Lester’s.
1 comment September 6th, 2007
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