Thirty-six years ago, the Beatles took time out from invading America to reinvent the rock 'n' roll movie as we knew it. Before 1964's A Hard Day's Night--the restoration of which kicks off this year's Reel Music series--films about pop stars lacked the very nerve and verve that made their music fun. As the Fab Four conquered the charts and approached their first movie deal, they swore they wouldn't make the same mistake. When the lads saw Richard Lester's experimental Running, Jumping and Standing Still Film, they knew they'd found someone to help map a new path into the music industry's movieland.

In the lexicon of gifted filmmakers, Richard Lester does not rank high. Try watching How I Won the War or Superman III. But Lester's marriage of vintage slapstick comedy with an avant-garde visual style--jump cuts, hand-held cameras, lightning-quick pacing--made the Beatles' first celluloid venture as fresh as their imprint on vinyl. A Hard Day's Night doesn't bother inventing trite melodrama (á la Elvis) to prop its stars' singing. Instead, Lester and screenwriter Alun Owen use a mock documentary--24 hours in the life of the band--to give rabid Beatle fans the cheeky rebellion they want to see and the songs they want to hear. And why not? I dare you to try erasing that title track or its accompanying screaming-girls chase scene from your gray matter after just a few bars.

Watchable as A Hard Day's Night remains, however, there has always been one unmatched rival to Lester's onscreen Beatlemania: the Beatles themselves. Throughout this brisk hour and some, John, Paul, George and Ringo seem madcap as Marx Brothers with mop-tops--charismatic boys next door with bravado. But if you've seen their press conference outside JFK Airport after touching down for the Ed Sullivan Show (or any number of other appearances behind the mic), you know the lads can be more witty and surreal left to their own voices. A Hard Day's Night's pioneering mix of reality and fiction is seen across the board today in movies, television and literature. The Beatles aren't presented as they actually were, but Lester's radiant, effortless sleight of hand continues to inspire.

For those of you who get enough of the Beatles from commercial jingles and VH1 profiles, this year's Reel Music series also offers a variety of other eagerly anticipated and undiscovered gems. Known for her riveting blue-collar portrait Harlan County, USA, documentarian Barbara Kopple returns with My Generation, which examines the Woodstock festivals of 1969, '94 and '99 to draw conclusions about the generations who made pilgrimages to upstate New York. Los Angeles film collector Mark Cantor will present Giants of Jazz, another evening of rare jazz performances on film, including such icons as Charlie Parker, Louis Armstrong and Charles Mingus, as well as under-appreciated masters like Rahsaan Roland Kirk. On Jan. 12 in the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Film Harmonic will premiere four short films from Portland filmmakers--Chel White, Gus Van Sant, Joan Gratz and Jim Blashfield--set to a live Oregon Symphony performance.

There are myriad other tantalizing offerings during the month, such as the Portland premiere of Alan Zweig's Vinyl, an amateurish but ultimately smart documentary about obsessive LP collectors made by one of their own. Whether you prefer films about sainted chart toppers or blundering bottomfeeders, passion and obsession for the song is consistent throughout Reel Music 18.