Let It Be (1970 film)

• 1. Documentary Origins And Concept

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  The Beatles gathered at Twickenham Film Studios on the 2nd of January 1969 to begin rehearsals for what was intended as a live concert broadcast. Paul McCartney had concluded that the group needed to return to their roots after the stressful sessions for The White Album wrapped up in October 1968. The plan involved giving a live performance featuring new songs, which would be recorded for release as an album without overdubs or recording tricks. John Lennon approved of this idea while George Harrison agreed that the new approach to recording held merit despite his time spent in Los Angeles and New York earlier that year. Many ideas were floated concerning the location of the concert including conventional venues like the Roundhouse in London and unusual spots such as a disused flour mill or an ocean liner. A Roman amphitheatre in Sabratha, Libya received significant consideration but no single idea gained unanimous enthusiasm among the band members. Denis O'Dell, head of Apple's film division, suggested filming the rehearsals in 16 mm format for use as a separate television documentary called Beatles at Work. Michael Lindsay-Hogg was hired as the director having previously worked with the Beatles on promotional films for Paperback Writer, Rain, Hey Jude and Revolution.

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• 2. Twickenham Rehearsal Tensions

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  The cold and austere conditions at Twickenham Film Studios constrained creativity and exacerbated tensions within the group during early January sessions. Cameraman Les Parrott recalled that his brief on the first day was simply to shoot The Beatles while sound crew instructions required rolling from the moment the first Beatle appeared until the last one left. Harrison later described these sessions as the low of all-time while Lennon called them hell and the most miserable sessions on earth. The infamous exchange between McCartney and Harrison occurred on Monday the 6th of January when McCartney seemed to criticize Harrison's guitar part on Two of Us. McCartney said I always hear myself annoying you and told Harrison this was not his intention. Harrison responded that McCartney no longer annoyed him and that he was content to play what McCartney wished or to not play at all. Around lunchtime on Friday the 10th of January tensions came to a head and Harrison told the others that he was leaving the band. This entire episode is omitted from the final film but Harrison later recalled getting his guitar and going home before writing Wah-Wah that afternoon. Towards the end of the 10th of January rehearsal Lennon raised the idea of drafting in Eric Clapton to play lead guitar if Harrison did not rejoin the band early the following week.

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• 3. Rooftop Concert Climax

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  On the 30th of January the Beatles and Billy Preston played on the rooftop of Apple headquarters for 42 minutes in cold winds about half of which ended up in the film. The group started with a rehearsal of Get Back then performed five songs including Don't Let Me Down, I've Got a Feeling, One After 909 and Dig a Pony. Police eventually made their way to the roof and tried to bring the show to close as it was disrupting businesses' lunch hour nearby. This prompted some ad-libbed lyrical asides from McCartney during the last performance of Get Back. The concert ends with applause from people on the rooftop and Lennon quipping I'd like to say thank you on behalf of the group and ourselves and I hope we passed the audition. The final portion of the film shows the unannounced concert intercut with reactions and comments from surprised Londoners gathering on the streets below. It remains the band's last public performance together despite being filmed just days before they reconvened in the basement studio inside Apple headquarters on Savile Row in London.

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• 4. Post-Production Editing Choices

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  A rough cut of the movie was screened for the Beatles on the 20th of July 1969 and Lindsay-Hogg recalled that version was about an hour longer than the released version. There was much more stuff of John and Yoko but the other three didn't really think that was appropriate because they wanted to make it a nicer movie. They didn't want to have a lot of the dirty laundry so a lot of it was cut down after viewing the released version. Lennon said he felt that the camera work was set up to show Paul and not to show anybody else and that the people that cut it made it look like Paul is God while others were just lying around. Lindsay-Hogg omitted any reference to Harrison leaving the sessions and temporarily quitting the group but managed to keep some of the interpersonal strains in the final cut. He retained scenes including the McCartney, Harrison exchange which he had captured by deliberately placing cameras where they would not be noticed. He also kept the scene described as the back of Paul's head as he's yammering on and John looks like he's about to die from boredom. In early 1970 it was decided to change the planned name of the film and associated album from Get Back to Let It Be matching the group's March 1970 single release.

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• 5. Critical Reception And Legacy

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  The world premiere of the film took place in New York City on the 13th of May 1970 with UK premieres held at the Liverpool Gaumont Cinema and London Pavilion one week later. None of the Beatles attended any of the premieres yet they won an Oscar for Let It Be in the category Original Song Score accepted by Quincy Jones on their behalf. Initial reviews were generally unfavourable with critics taking issue with technical and conceptual qualities while focusing particularly on it as a document of fractured relationships within the band. The British press were especially critical with The Sunday Telegraph commenting that it is only incidentally that we glimpse anything about their real characters. Penelope Gilliatt of The New Yorker deemed it a very bad film and a touching one about the breaking apart of this reassuring family of siblings. Time said rock scholars and Beatles fans will be enthralled while others may consider it only a mildly enjoyable documentary newsreel. Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reports that 81% of 54 critics' reviews are positive with an average rating of 7.3 out of 10 indicating generally favorable retrospective reception.

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• 6. Home Media Availability Struggles

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  The film was first released on VHS, Betamax and LaserDisc in 1981 by Magnetic Video and on RCA CED videodisc in 1982 but the transfer to video was not considered high quality. In particular the already-cropped theatrical version was again cropped to a 4:3 aspect ratio for television which prompted considerable bootlegging of the film. The lack of availability has led to copies circulating first on VHS and later on DVD derived from early 1980s releases. An anonymous industry source told the Daily Express in July 2008 that McCartney and Starr blocked the release of the film on DVD due to concerns about the effect on the band's global brand if the public sees the darker side of the story. Neither Paul nor Ringo would feel comfortable publicising a film showing the Beatles getting on each other's nerves according to Apple insiders. However in 2016 McCartney stated he was not opposed to an official re-release saying I keep bringing it up and everyone goes Yeah we should do that while the objection should be me since I don't come off well.

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• 7. Peter Jackson Restoration Project

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  It was announced on the 30th of January 2019 the fiftieth anniversary of the Beatles' rooftop concert that a new film built around 55 hours of never-before-seen footage and 140 hours of audio would be directed by Peter Jackson. The intention of the documentary was to provide a new level of insight into the band's dynamics during the album's creation and was made with cooperation from McCartney, Starr, Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison. Jackson's film was to be followed by a remastered re-release of Lindsay-Hogg's original film which became available in 4K on Disney+ for the first time on the 8th of May 2024. Jackson said about the film version Let It Be is the climax of Get Back while Get Back provides a vital missing context for Let It Be. Lindsay-Hogg qualified the differences between the two projects in 2023 by describing his version as a great short story and Jackson's as a great novel. The restored 4K version marked the first time it had been publicly screened since its original theatrical release after decades of limited distribution and internal disputes preventing official home video releases.

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