 H.M.D. FEATURE REVIEW The Fab Four On DVD! Part 1:"A Hard Days' Night"  Part 1- A Hard Day’s Night With the release of The BEATLES: Anthology 5 disc box set on DVD, I thought I’d better get on the ball and do some reviews on some of their other ones; officially or not. Ahh, The Beatles. The mere mention of their name conjures up different feelings for everyone. They were a quintessential voice of their generation. Their look, sound and feel was like an atomic bomb that had been on dropped on American culture. Their timing was impeccable when they arrived in New York in 1964, the nation was still in mourning after the assassination of JFK. They were the beginning of a new era in music and influence. I, unfortunately, was never a huge Beatles fan. Then some of the bands that I have seen regularly when asked of their influences, a majority of the time would say the Beatles. I never really got to hear much of their material on the radio due to the fact that WTUE refuses to play more than 2 songs of theirs and every once in a blue moon at that. When all the whoopla was centered on the BEATLES: Anthology mini-series back in late ’95, I sat down and tried to watch it. The bug hadn’t bitten me yet but the fever was already coming on. The Anthology discs were selling like hotcakes! However, the radio didn’t really play the “new” songs hardly at all. Fast forward nearly 6 years later – right about the time George Harrison died from cancer, I was thinking about picking up 1. Without a doubt the dreadful news had come, Harrison had passed on. I had liked a few of their solo efforts growing up but never really bought an album. I always liked a few of Paul’s songs and John’s “Imagine” but it was George’s cover of “Got My Mind Set On You” in 1987 and the 2 versions of the videos that got my first interest into Beatlemania. Upon completion of my purchase of 1 I began to “feel the fever” as they say. I set out on a new mission to experience Beatlemania myself. I more or less began at the beginning. I found a used copy of the “Beatles Tapes”, their very first recordings, and moved up to Please Please Me and then to With The Beatles. The one thing that I noticed right away was the inclusion of (British) on the top label. Then I found out that these were the original versions of the albums as they were released in the UK. The American versions of their early albums were all mixed up and not correctly compiled. However, I couldn’t help to notice the increasingly better quality of their material as they grew as songwriters. Thankfully, by the time I was ready to purchase the A Hard Day’s Night album, the DVD was nearly completed. YAY! To really get a feel for it, I remembered that the library had an old copy on VHS. So I checked it out and was rolling on some of the scenes in no time at all. Their charm and intellect was well beyond their years. Each one had a distinctive personality and needed the others to make the magic that had become known as the “Fab Four”. At last, the day had come for the DVD release by Xmas of 2002!! I was ecstatic! I proudly wore my Beatles t-shirt, like I do for some of my favorite bands when I purchase their new release, and rushed to Best Buy to get my copy. I then promptly sat down at home and let my powers of observation due their tireless work of detail! The cover box is chock full-o-goodies. Any obsessive fan of bands like them, KISS, Elvis or whomever, have a knack for noticing detail. Believe you me, if there were one minute detail that was incorrect, the fans will tell you about it! The box itself is silver with “windows” of each member in them. The full picture is on the slide out case. The “summery” and track listing of the features on this disc are on a separate card adhered on the plastic shrink-wrap. The disc is compiled very nicely. It’s very generously filled with bonus footage and several interviews with nearly all the surviving members of the cast and crew, sans the Beatles themselves of course. I can see why, sorta. If you can’t have all four it loses something, I think. The bonus disc features some DVD-Rom features as well. The slide out case contains the actual discs in black and white versions, in keeping with the continuity of the film. There’s stills of each member including Wilfrid Brambell, who plays Paul’s grandfather, with Ringo. Disc 1, in white, includes the movie itself. Digitally remastered in widescreen format and is enhanced for the new HDTV’s in the 16 x 9 televisions. Disc 2 in black, contains all the bonus goodies. It’s not grotty at all! Intricate detail is placed on the interviews and recollections of the cast members and crew themselves. One of the successes with the DVD format is the creative start up menus. They can be just as entertaining as the movie itself sometimes. The one here, for example, has a Beatles-esq drum beat and crowds screaming. Something very familiar when it comes to the band! Overall, the layout and content of the disc will hold out over time just as the music of this legendary quartet have for nearly half a century. I won’t spoil it all for you. Enjoy it again or for the first time. Welcome to the height of Beatlemania! Sonny Thomas 7.10.03 |
