Tuesday, July 07, 2020

Ringo du Jour: Help!

It being Ringo's birthday and yesterday being the 63rd anniversary of the day John & Paul met, I've been in a Beatles mood. Surprise, right?

One thing that's always bugged me is Beatles fans who snobbishly turn up their nose at the movie Help! Yes, A Hard Day's Night is a better movie, in fact it's an incredibly influential one - per Roger Ebert on the film:
"Today when we watch TV and see quick cutting, hand-held cameras, interviews conducted on the run with moving targets, quickly intercut snatches of dialogue, music under documentary action and all the other trademarks of the modern style, we are looking at the children of A Hard Day's Night."
Nobody disputes that A Hard Day's Night is one of the all-time great films, but I don't like people turning their nose up at Help! And finally, someone agrees with me, mostly because it's just FUN:
Even some of the conversational gags are surreal. After finding that the dreaded ring is made from a metal outside the failed jewelers’ sphere of experience, the Beatles look for new tools to break. Ringo remembers that the Fire Brigade once got his head out of some railings. Even though he didn’t want them to because he used to leave it there when he “wasn’t using it for school. You can see a lot of the world from railings.”
The Beatles themselves were natural comedians who knew each other’s rhythms. John does a really good Ringo when he’s impersonating him on the soccer field. He captures his body language and even his off rhythms.
But again, it's fun! And in technicolor and, most importantly, you got to hang out with The Beatles being The Beatles for an hour and a half!

And of course we all wanted to live in that house with them.

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