Get Your Reps In: Start the New Year With “A Hard Day’s Night”

A Hard Day’s Night (1964)

A Hard Day’s Night screens Jan. 2 at the Tomorrow Theater, accompanied by a set of Beatles covers by the Portland band Cruise Control. Also on theme, the Portland Art Museum is currently exhibiting a Paul McCartney photo collection across town.

The first and arguably most seminal Beatles film, A Hard Day’s Night has an eensy bit of plot, intermittently instigated by the high jinks of Paul’s tour-crashing grandpa (Wilfrid Brambell), who briefly convinces Ringo to leave the band.

But mostly we’re here for the music and the ecstatic black-and-white sequences of the Fab Four playing themselves and goofing off nonstop. In this era of coordinated hair and outfits, they move almost like one impish organism as they elude throngs of screaming fans or tease posh, stiff-lipped Brits of the prior generation and upper crust.

As an article of celebrity enshrinement, A Hard Day’s Night is a joyful paradox—myth making premised on winking demystification, and having a blast with both. It’s a balance perhaps best exemplified in one George Harrison line, assessing Ringo’s bad mood before a TV taping:

“He’s very fussy about his drums, you know? They loom large in his legend.” Tomorrow, Jan. 2.

Also Playing:

Cinema 21: The Room (2003), Jan. 3. Strangers on a Train (1951), Jan. 4. Cinemagic: Best in Show (2000), Jan. 1. High Fidelity (2000), Jan. 1. Perfect Blue (1997), Jan. 1. Split Second (1992), Jan. 3 on VHS. Clinton: The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Jan. 4. Hollywood: Mobile Suit Gundam: Char’s Counterattack (1988), Jan. 5. Rage To Kill (1987), Jan. 7. Tomorrow: Kung Fu Hustle (2004), Jan. 3. Twilight (2008), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009) and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010) in a triple feature, Jan. 4. Matilda (1996), Jan. 5. Basquiat (1996) in black and white, Jan. 5.