Review: "Eight Days a Week" by Ron Howard

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A few days ago, Pathé Live presented us in preview the documentary of Ron Howard (Rush, Cocoon). Eight Days A Week was released for a single session on September 15, and it is a success. The 62-year-old director gives us here a documentary on the essential group of our time, and at the same time legendary: the Beatles. 

The first documentary since Beatles Anthology released in 1995, The Beatles : Eigh Days a Week focuses on the "Beatlemania" period of the group. Their beginnings in bars, to land in front of 56,000 people at Shea Stadium in New York, Ron Howard shows us the rise of this flagship group of the 60s. It is not enough for a renowned director and the parent production company to produce a good documentary. We need unpublished images, testimonies. And Howard takes up the challenge against a backdrop of buzzing teenage girls screaming until they faint.

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And unprecedented, we have. In addition to carefully mastering archival footage, which remains the mainstay of this documentary, the film consists of completely remastered images for the pleasure of our eyes, and especially our ears. Indeed the film is not based on reconstructions, almost all the images are concerts, interviews, all more authentic than the others. And the particularity of this film is how much it detaches itself from our reality. The narration, the dialogues, everything comes straight out of their time. The only thing that pulls us out of this dream of boy band are the few testimonies of composers, artists, and Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney according to their opinion today. From this point of view, the film almost makes us sympathize with these 4 legends that are right before our eyes in 4K definition. 

Confronting this juggernaut of music history was a challenge. Films, books, CDs, merchandising, testimonials and publications on the Beatles are countless. So to wonder if we knew the band but not their history, the answer is yes. Revisits essential singles, backstage tours, new concerts, Eight Days a Week offers us these authentic images that bring us almost personally closer for 2 hours to these 4 legends of music.

https://youtu.be/XEL25o8W-4U