Yesterday (Blu-ray) [2019] [Region Free]

It’s fantasy and fable so it doesn’t have to make sense. Even so, the mind recoils from illogicality, as there’s nothing worse than nonsense in the making and progression of a story. To be believable there must be sensible continuity. Otherwise the project becomes daft, which this one certainly is.First we are asked to believe that the Beatles never existed. A lousy premise to start with, as it means we’ll hear none of their music in the film. But wait! The songs appear, reinvented by a mediocre folk singer named Jack Malik. Where did the songs come from if their creators never recorded them? Who knows? We just have to accept that Jack has heard songs no one — or almost no one — has heard. How has this happened? Via another barmy event, a global blackout that lasts for some minutes. While the blackout ensues Jack is knocked off his bike by a bus that loses control. He wakes up in hospital some time later, his dutiful and beautiful manager/friend/girlfriend Ellie by his side. He’s missing two front teeth. His memory — or the world’s memory — has been jarred or disrupted. Certain cultural things from the past are forgotten. But Jack, alone among mortals, remembers. What does he remember that no one else can? Coca Cola, for instance. Or Harry Potter, Oasis and the Beatles. Coke is gone but Pepsi remains. No Harry Potter but Harold Potter existed, a soldier who fought in the First World War (according to Google). No Fab Four of John, Paul, George and Ringo, either.The songs are timeless, beautiful, enduring works of art. The Beatles will go on forever, or as long as forever lasts in the cultural memory of civilisation. But this is a probable truth in reality, not in this convoluted fable. Jack can’t believe the world is suffering from collective amnesia. So his struggle now is to reconstruct the songs, their melodies, chord changes, and especially their lyrics. He struggles comically with one song in particular — “Eleanor Rigby”. It’s driving him crazy because it’s a story within a song (lasting less than three minutes ) where every word counts. Eleanor is alone in the world and will die alone. But there’s also a Father McKenzie in it who does things — darns socks, writes sermons, stands over graves, wipes dirt from his hands, etc. Jack can’t work out the sequence of events. He can’t piece things together to make it work. He also can’t sleep, haunted by Eleanor and her neglect. He needs to tell her story to the world.With Ellie’s help through love and encouragement, and through a local DJ’s good ear (who helps get some of the tracks down on demo), Jack finally starts to reach the public, which is something he couldn’t do before. He has a decent singing voice but little else. Simple guitar strumming, dishevelled looks, minimal stage presence and intelligence. He’s a no-hoper working as a stocker in warehouse who has essentially given up on his dreams of making music. That is, until the global blackout and accident happen.Well, needless to say, he hits the big time. How could he not? Jackmania, a variant of Beatlemania, ensues. Unprepared, he’s catapulted into the madness of stardom. Problem is — marketing. How to sell this no-hoper to the public. The songs are great, beautiful, astonishing — all the things Jack isn’t. His makeover will have to be major. Thus enter the Americans, and in particular L.A., and in particular there a ruthless female music producer whose main job is to stylise and market Jack to consumers. Her job looks monumental and thankless, as Jack from Lowestoft is definitely not GQ material.The stress and strain of stardom begin to take their toll. Jack isn’t happy. First, he knows he’s a fraud, an imposter. Second, he loves Ellie but is too shy or socially awkward to declare his love, as they have known each other since childhood as friends. She loves him too but has been dutifully, passively waiting for him to make the first move. So, a slow, old-fashioned romance that pretty much jars with the rest of the frenetic proceedings in the film.Please stop reading this review if you don’t want something interesting in the film — or at least interesting for me — revealed now.Inexplicably, Jack is not alone in remembering the Beatles (who never existed). Two others remember them too: a woman from Liverpool and a man from Moscow. The woman saw Jack in Liverpool when he flew there from L.A. Why did he do that? Because, as previously mentioned, he was stuck with the lyrics of “Eleanor Rigby”. Perhaps a visit to Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields and the old churchyard where Eleanor is reputed to be buried would help bring the lyrics back. The mysterious woman sees Jack in the churchyard and intuits he is up to something important, though not revealed until the film nearly ends. The Russian man sees Jack performing “Back in the U.S.S.R.” in Moscow at a concert where he is second bill to Ed Sheeran, a nondescript English pop star who can’t seem to find a comb to drag through his hair. He and the woman from Liverpool appear together in Suffolk toward the end of the film when Jack plays a rooftop concert from a hotel in Gorelston-on-Sea. He sings “Help” to the crowd, reaching out to it with his confusion and pain (which of course almost no one recognises as confusion and pain). However, the Liverpudlian woman and Russian man realize what Jack is going through. They love and miss the Beatles too. They visit Jack in his dressing room at the hotel, and there the woman hands a note to him.On the paper a name and address are written. We don’t see what he sees but soon understand the note’s significance. On a bright and sunny day Jack drives toward a lonely seaside cottage along the Suffolk coast. Inside the cottage on a desk are paintbrushes in glass jars. A long-haired man wearing wired-rimmed glasses answers the door when Jack knocks. He looks like John Lennon. He is! John was alive all along and now is 78. But the world never knew this because he kept on painting instead of making music. He’s quiet, mellow and happy. He loves his wife, he says, though he doesn’t tell Jack her name. Has to be Cynthia, right? — the wife who loved him before the world did. Jack is moved to tears to be with John and wants to hug him. John considers this strange but lets him. And he leaves Jack with some simple but important advice: pursue the one you love and always tell the truth. Peace comes with these things.This film isn’t much, just an extended gimmick. But the presence of John in it redeems it emotionally for me. Yes, we still miss him. We miss the cheek and wit, the spontaneity and honesty. If John had not met Paul at that church fete in Woolton with their guitars in 1957 the Beatles would never have existed. John probably would have been a painter or illustrator. And Paul? Maybe a farmer in Scotland. And Eleanor Rigby? Asleep in her grave in the old churchyard.An amusing fable perhaps worth watching, but only because of the generous glimpse of John near the end. It was lovely to see him again. Jack thought so too, which is why he cried and wanted that hug.

It’s a dvd. What more can be said.

Really enjoyed this film. We’ve watched it twice in 2 weeks

Good film.

Loved it

What a lovely film, great music (though you need to like the Beatles). Good love story and brilliantly acted with an outrageous story which is compelling

I won’t bother going over the premise of the film, as that’s widely available elsewhere. Whatever you do, don’t compare this to ‘Rocketman’ or ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, as they are biopics where this is fantasy, and suffice to say it’s damned good too. Don’t concern yourself about how Earth was suddenly plunged into darkness and why Jack Malik is the only person who remembers the Beatles. Just enjoy the film and the amusing jokes spread about. So, what’s the Blu-ray version like?The transfer is excellent, as it should be, and there’s plenty of bonus features. For the most part these are well worth seeing but things such as interviews with the director and writer I can live without. That being said, I quite enjoy commentaries as the why, where and how make more sense when you see it at the same time. The deleted scenes are always worth watching, and in this instance there are a dozen of them, but a ‘Director’s Cut’ with those scenes inserted would be far better, as viewed in isolation they do lose some of their impact. However, much like the alternative opening and ending, and having watched those two it was wise to change them both, those excised scenes wouldn’t have added much to the film anyway. (The aborted recording for Nutters Italian Ice Cream is the best of the bunch - “She loves IT yeah, yeah, yeah” indeed).Also included in the bonuses are three songs performed live at Abbey Road, a gag reel (but there are a mere four and aren’t at all funny), a bit about the writer and director as told by the actors alongside some background filming; a bit on the Jack and Ellie characters as told by themselves, Ed Sheeran being in the film, and a short Kate McKinnon feature. By the way, if you still wonder how Earth was plunged into darkness for 12 seconds, an explanation, of sorts, is on the commentary.Could a film such as this have worked with another artist? I doubt it, as the songs of the Beatles are so well known that even album only tracks are familiar to many, a claim no one else can manage. Fortunately, Jack (and Himesh Patel sings everything) doesn’t simply copy the songs as we know them; witness the near grunge version of ‘Help!’.You might not watch those extras more than once, but don’t let that make it a deciding factor. It’s a brilliant film.