The Beatles - The First US Visit

Customer Reviews:

It was fourty years ago today .........!!!.......2004-03-01

At the risk of showing my age, if you really want a nostalgic whiff of Beatlemania that depicts what it was really like at the time then this will beat hands down all the other contenders (yes I accept the full Anthology set will satisfy the historic completist but this is the brief time snapshot that is worth it's weight in gold in showing their initial impact and why the Beatles meant so much to so many people in the mid-1960s).

Given the paucity of few UK complete visual recordings (e.g. no London Palladium or Royal Variety Show tapes kept)or UK documentaries, we must be forever grateful to whoever at UK Granada TV had the great insight to guess that in hitting the US for just over one week with the platform of the Ed Sullivan shows (NY and Miami)and an intervening live show in Washington DC would deliver a unique artefact of Beatlemania. On top of that to then decide to use the Maysles Brothers with their "hands on" cinema verite style to make these historic recordings was a truly inspired choice (proven yet again in their later "Gimme Shelter" documentary of the Rolling Stones in the late 1960s).

While the recordings of certain parts of this DVD may be topped in quality elsewhere in other recent releases, having seen this documentary several times in torrid "old TV" tapes format across the 1980s in UK cinemas this DVD is a very good quality version given access to the original tapes. The additional footage of deleted scenes plus Albert Maysle commenting on what it was like really like in making the film, underlines that this is an amazing record with a level of access to the Beatles that was never repeated plus captures beautifully how fully they conquered the USA in 1964, without realising at the time what they had achieved.

Interesting other observations having watched the DVD several times are how much all four Beatles were in strong personal empathy ( especially Ringo as the lynchpin of a lot of their dry humour which so enraptured them to the Americans and against the backdrop of the prior sacking of Pete Best)plus the growing absence of Lennon (based on the film footage shown here)who seems already to have started to inhabit his own space.

A priceless visual documentary record!

A fly on the wall account of Beatlemania US style!.......2004-02-10

An interesting historical documentary showing that the Beatles in reality were very close to the personalities "given to them" by directer Dick Lester in a Hard Days Night - John (aloof, cocky and cool)Paul (pretty, clever and a little full of himself) George (the baby, wide eyed and innocent) and Ringo (charming,jokey and happy to be along for the ride).

Included are their first 3 performances on Ed Sullivan - 70 million for their first show!!!! I'm A Celebrity eat your heart out!! - and the Washington Coloseum show where the Beatles themselves had to keep constructing their own podium so that all sides of the audience could see them. The footage of this show is average to say the least! Included is a 50 minute "Making Of" extra where the director outlines how the documentary was made and there is also his commentary throughout the main film.

Although good I can't imagine it would interest anyone other than Beatle completists or contemporary historians. I certainly wouldn't buy it if you have the Anthology VHS/DVD and the recent Ed Sullivan DVD as you'll have the bulk of it already.

Customer Reviews:

Second Rate Country Singer-First Rate Heel.......2008-02-24

"Maury Dann, the second-rate country singer and first-rate heel played by Rip Torn." Ken Tucker

Payday is a film that left me feeling forlorn, a feeling of emptiness and what's next. Rip Torn played his character, Maury Dann, true to form. A country singer on his way down from never near the top. He cheats, wheedles, lies and moves on so easily without remorse, using whomever he needs to, I wonder what is the purpose of his life. It seems he has little regard for those who travel with him or might love him. His purpose is to make money to pay for the booze, women and song that make up his life. The surrounding players had little or no effect on me, but, of course, they made the film a whole. I can see in my mind's eye that this course of life goes on daily with hundreds of people moving through the country or rock scene. How sad a life, how very very sad.

"As a portrait of the music industry of that era -- Maury bribes DJs to play records and makes sure to get paid in cash after yowling tunes in tattered roadhouses -- the low-budget Payday is far superior to Robert Altman's overrated, condescending 1975 drama Nashville. Payday both loves its subject and never lets its antihero off the hook." Ken Tucker

Recommended. Best advice, view this film on a bright sunny day.
prisrob 02-14-08

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