The most influential and successful pop band of all-time is undoubtedly The Beatles.
As well as Help and A Hard Day’s Night, there have been several documentaries and films about the fab four. Here are a few that are all available to watch with UK IPTV Subscription.
Beatles 64
A stunning snapshot of the band’s hectic first US tour is created by combining incredible archive footage with current interviews.
The Beatles show an endless energy, laughing and cracking wise, and seemingly never in a bad mood with the cameras constantly thrusting themselves in their faces. They glow with joy and incredulous bafflement at the surreal storm raging around them. No one is quite sure who gave the New York radio DJ Murray Kaufman, also known as Murray the K, permission to hang out with them in their hotel room, and they are irritable and perplexed by his success.
The Beatles: Get Back
In January 1969, The Beatles set out to write and record new songs for their first live show in more than two years, culminating in an impromptu concert atop their Savile Row studio.
Directed by Peter Jackson entirely from never-before-seen, restored footage, it provides the most intimate and honest glimpse into the creative process and relationship between John, Paul, George, and Ringo ever filmed.
In January 1969, The Beatles entered the recording studio to write and rehearse the songs for their album ‘Let It Be’. They are on a very tight schedule as they intend to debut the songs in a live performance within a few weeks. The live performance will be the album. A camera crew is recording everything that goes on in the studio in order to make a film out of the experience. This is an edited version of what they captured.
Let It Be
Let It Be is a 1970 British documentary film starring the Beatles and directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg. The film documents the group’s rehearsing and recording songs in January 1969 for what was to become their twelfth and final studio album Let It Be. The film ends with an unannounced rooftop concert by the group, their last public performance together.
The film was originally planned as a television documentary that would accompany a concert broadcast. When plans for the concert were dropped, the project became a feature film production.
Footage filmed for Let It Be was later restored and re-edited for Peter Jackson’s 2021 documentary The Beatles: Get Back.
Magical Mystery Tour
The Beatles made-for television film, Magical Mystery Tour caused outrage and derision when it was first aired on BBC on Boxing Day in 1967.
On Monday, 11th September, 1967, Paul McCartney and a group of friends and Beatles’ associates boarded a coach. It stopped off in Surrey to pick-up John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr and embarked on an unplanned trip around West Country, and ending up in Newquay, Cornwall.
Just under four months later, after filming a final scene in a Kent airfield, the BBC premiered the hour-long Magical Mystery Tour. It features John Lennon’s I Am the Walrus, Paul McCartney’s The Fool on the Hill, and George Harrison’s Blue Jay Way among other tracks.
Yellow Submarine
In the very colourful animation, Yellow Submarine (released in 1968), the music-loving utopia of Pepperland is besieged by the music-hating Blue Meanies. Captain Fred boards the titular yellow submarine to seek assistance on the mayor’s orders. Given their musical prowess and similarity to Pepperland’s favorite band, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, he finds The Beatles and begs for their assistance. The Beatles travel back to Pepperland with Old Fred, inspiring the local populace to rebel against the Blue Meanies.
George Dunning’s experimental experience combined with art director Heinz Edelmann’s idea of a medley of visual styles resulted in the use of a variety of animation techniques, including rotoscoping, which combined animation with live-action video, still images, and paintings to provide an imaginative interpretation of “limited animation.”
The Beatles: Eight Days a Week
In 1963, Beatlemania swept across mainland Europe, and in 1964, they took over America. Their revolutionary world tours undoubtedly created mass entertainment as we know it today and permanently altered youth culture around the world. The group was simultaneously writing and recording a string of incredibly popular singles and albums. However, the decision to stop touring was made in 1966 due to the unrelenting pressure of such extraordinary fame, which in turn caused uncontrollable turmoil. The Beatles were then able to concentrate on a number of albums that revolutionized recorded music in the years that followed.
