A Hard Day’s Night, directed by Richard Lester, tells the story, in a fun style, of the well famed British band, The Beatles. The story focuses on the journey from their origin city, Liverpool to London, for a televised performance. The story unfolds as the four-men group encounter various adventures while running from their fans, the police, and even Paul McCartney’s grandfather. Although they face “bumps” in the road, the band eventually successfully makes it their scheduled performance in London, and wow fans yet again.

Directed in manner which portrays continuous happiness,and accompanied by the band;s soundtrack which is comprised of well known hits like “A Hard Day’s Night”, and “Can’t Buy me Love”, it is no surprise that the movie was a mega hit with the British and international audience, and becoming a financial and critical success.  In 2005, Time.com named it one of the 100 best films of the last 80 years (Corliss, 2005). However, even in the face of such positive reception, it is important to note, that A Hard Day’s Night is the most well known for being one of the best marketing campaign, raising the Beatles’ popularity at rocket ship. When the movie was approved for production and began spotting in early 1964, the Beatles’ were a semi popular name in the UK, during its release in July of the same year, the Beatles were a household name across the globe. The surge of popularity is mostly credited to their performance in the United States during their appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show in February of 1964. But if it was not for A Hard Day’s Night, the epidemic of Beatlemania, or, the term given to the intense fan frenzy directed towards the English rock band which usually included intense levels of hysteria and high-pitched screaming by female fans, both at concerts and during the band’s travels, would have never been so known. As said by Bob Neaverson, a writer on the Beatles, “the phenomenon of Beatlemania could not and would not have been either as substantial or as durable without the identificatory process afforded by cinema” (“Tell Me” 152).

While researching the critical review on the movie, I came across the academic article Mythology, remythology, and demythology: The beatles on film by Todd F. Davis, which describes the use of the Beatles’ initial small appeal, barely a small flame, and the immense “ignition” of the flame into a wild fire, by utilizing film, change of appearance, and the growth of media’s influence on the crowd.

After watching the movie, I absolutely agree with Davis’ point.

They movie was not hard to watch, however, after closer examination, one realizes that there is no substantial plot assigned to it, and without the band starring in the film or the use of their well known songs, it would definitely not have been as successful, meaning this movie is categorized as main stream, it was produced by a large corporation, used previous material like the musical aspect, and have several sequels, like “Help!” and “Yellow Submarine”. As Davis’ puts it, “With A Hard Day’s Night, the Beatles accomplished this end by deftly crafting images for each of the band members that their later films, in one fashion or another, would attempt to echo” (Davis, 2006).

Overall, this movie was easy to watch, emphasized how the popularity of the most well known twentieth century band came to be, and allows viewers to have more a view into a day in a life of a rock star. There is a reason Time Magazine called it, “One of the smoothest, freshest, funniest films ever made for purposes of exploitation” (Time 1964).

Sources:
Womack, K., & Davis, T. F. (2006). Mythology, remythology, and demythology: The beatles on film. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Yeah? Yeah. Yeah!: Yeah? Yeah. Yeah! (1964, August 14).