Whose Life Is It Anyway?

SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed.

 The question in the title of the film Whose Life Is It Anyway? (1981) revolves around the question of suicide. It is considered a sin in some religions and against the law in many places because it involves the taking of a life. But, the counter argument is that it should be the choice of the individual, if that person is deemed rational, and if performed so no one else is harmed. This movie presents the discussion of whether or not to keep an individual alive artificially if the quality of life under those circumstances is intolerable to the individual.

 

The story centers on the character of Ken Harrison (Richard Dreyfuss, giving an Oscar-worthy performance). His young life is made meaningful by his work as a creator of modern sculptures. The first shot is of him putting the finishing touches on a large piece situated on a building. He is joyful and playful as his girlfriend, Pat (Janet Eilber), says he produced a big pile of “sticks,” and he jokes as he says he used her as a model. That ecstatic feeling is demolished in a moment as he drives away and a truck runs a traffic light, causing his sports car to crash under the massive vehicle. 

 

The ambulance evacuates Ken to a hospital emergency room. He has multiple fractures, a collapsed lung, and injuries to his spleen and kidneys. The attending physician, Dr. Michael Emerson (John Cassavetes), immediately yells at the almost unconscious Ken that he has to “Fight!” With that one exhortation the film establishes the conflict that will develop between Ken and Emerson as to how to deal with these tragic circumstances. As Emerson and the surgeon look over the x-rays, they conclude that the most serious injury is a neck fracture, and the surgeon says that realistically the best they can hope for is quadriplegia. Emerson’s primary goal however is that he wants the man “alive,” despite the immense deprivations involved.

 

Ken deals with his awful condition by using humor, which is many times dark, because it allows him and the audience to tolerate the situation. When the nurse asks if she can get him something, he asks for a “martini,” and says he thought everyone in intensive care got “gin” instead of water. He is brought into his room inverted and says he would recognize Pat anywhere by her “shoes.” He tells Pat that they’ll have to tell those holding a scheduled dinner-dance that the two of them will “be late.” Even though this joking is a safety device, it keeps him from facing the dire position he is in and does not allow him to confront his true feelings, at least not until later. 

 

The image of his recent sculpture is displayed and its physical completion contrasts with Ken’s current bedridden state which suggests that the piece of art will be the last work he will ever finish. Six months have passed. Nurse Rodriguez (Alba Oms) introduces him to a new nurse, Mary Jo Sadler (Kaki Hunter). He continues to make jokes, including ones that are sexually suggestive, such as saying he used to dream about “being massaged by two beautiful women.” He uses this humor to compensate for his current lack of ability involving intimacy. But his sadness creeps in when Rodriguez says they don't want him on the floor, and he says that being had on the floor would be “incredible,” but more likely “improbable.” He says that he went skateboarding with a lovely nurse the night before, but he was the skateboard. He is rolled over and hints how lovely it is that Mary Jo is rubbing his ass, but it’s really only his ankles. He kids about not wanting the fantasy destroyed, but the sad thing is that he can’t feel anything, so the only pleasure he can have is in his imagination. Pat visits, and we discover she also uses her body for artistic purposes since she is a dancer. She tells him she still loves him, but what joined them is no longer there. 

 

John, the Jamaican orderly (Thomas Carter), is compatible with Ken since John offers no sentimentality. While he trims Ken’s beard he says he wants to see him tap dance. Ken voices that he wished he could at least masturbate, let alone have encounters with women, which is what John can do. It shows how much we take for granted until we are deprived of those joys of everyday life. John has a band, and he mimics playing the xylophone, pretending Ken’s body is the instrument (artistic imagination stressed again). He says the patient’s knee needs some “tuning.” His playfulness is a welcome diversion for Ken, who vicariously enjoys hearing about another artist's pursuits. 

 Dr. Clare Scott (Christine Lahti) next visits Ken and she presents an upbeat demeanor as she talks about increasing his physical therapy so that he can lead a more “normal life.” Ken sees no purpose in her plan, and sarcastically asks if it will mean “I can resume my basketball career?” Ken realistically sees that he will never be able to regain what for him was “normal.” She is able to come up with a comical comment saying that he is too short to play basketball which makes him smile and pull back on his edgy attitude. Ken heard that Emerson was doing rounds and he asks if the doctor will be doing it while “walking on water.” Ken obviously thinks that Emerson makes god-like decisions that do not allow for the patient to determine his own treatment.

 

On his rounds with third year medical students, Emerson comes across a man of fifty-six years of age who just died. He questions the intern to make sure everything was done to save him. Emerson is an “extreme measures” sort of doctor. When one of the students yawns, Emerson is outraged that he isn’t sick that they lost a man under seventy years of age. He calls death the “enemy,” and that if they care more about patients than money then they should feel ill when the enemy has won. 

 

Nurse Mary Jo tries to give Ken a drink that he clearly doesn’t want, as he says it looks like somebody “already drank it.” He turns his head and knocks the liquid all over himself. He tries to kid about how a person “who can’t move a muscle” can still make a mess. She is flustered and embarrassed by her actions and moves him around quickly to end the incident. He says something about being like Charlie McCarthy, the puppet in a comedy routine, because that is how powerless he feels. He makes another dark joke by asking, “How did the quadriplegic cross the road? He was stapled to a chicken.” This gallows humor is the only way some can deal with the unthinkable. She then pushes him to the side too far and he almost falls off the bed. He keeps saying how it was not Mary Jo’s fault and it was “just an accident.” He is there because of an “accident,” but it doesn’t make what happens any easier to accept. Not only the patient but also those that care for him feel defeated by what has happened. 

 

Emerson shows up and the humiliated Ken doesn’t want the student physicians to see him so compromised. Emerson examines Ken’s neck movements and tells him “You’ll be fine.” Ken’s response is “Are you kidding?” These two are definitely not on the same page. Emerson says that he is approaching discharge, which Ken wants probably so he can have some autonomy, but then he finds out he will be going to a rehabilitation facility. Ken is sarcastic when he says, “You just grow the vegetables here. The vegetable store is somewhere else.” When he asks directly for the first time if he will ever regain the use of his limbs, Emerson says he will not. Despite the shock of this reality, Ken thanks the doctor for his “honesty.” However, the doctor says that people learn to accept things. But that generalization, like many, is not always true.

 

Dr. Scott and Dr. Emerson prescribe an increase in Ken’s sedatives, and when Scott brings the Valium, he says he doesn’t want it. He wishes to hold onto his anger and freedom which includes being noisy if he so desires. He tells her just because they can’t fix him that “does not mean I’m the one that has to get tranquilized.” It's as if they want to cover up their being uncomfortable with their lack of success by quieting him down. He says point-blank that all he has left is his “consciousness” and he doesn’t want “that paralyzed as well.” He is trying to hold onto what’s left of his individuality. 

 

At lunch, Scott is becoming Ken’s advocate and tells Emerson that Valium isn’t emergency medicine, and she questions how it will help Ken. Emerson, acting all-powerful here, says that Ken isn’t ready to accept his predicament yet, and the sedatives are to calm him until he is ready. He adds that it is their job to get him to accept his new life. Emerson, although meaning well, does not take into account the feelings, ideas, or wishes of the patient. He gets a syringe of Valium and prepares to inject it into Ken. Ken says he no longer wants to live, and Emerson, unable to accept that, says it is Ken’s depression talking. Ken specifically tells Emerson not to inject him, but Emerson ignores his request under the reason that it is medically necessary. Ken is outraged at this violation of his freedom. Emerson says he is just like Ken when he is sculpting, because he, too, refuses to give up on a project. But Ken rightly points out the difference between manipulating an inanimate object and a person, accusing Emerson of treating him like a “lump of clay.”

 

While he is sedated, Ken has memories of how he sketched and sculpted renditions of Pat. These images show how their lives intertwined and were full of movement, which just accentuates his current anguish as he looks at his unresponsive hands. When Pat comes the next day he refers to himself in the past tense, and says that he is no longer the person she loved. He wants her to leave and not come back because he wants her to have a real life with someone who can love her back. He says if their roles were reversed he would leave her “flat.” Most likely he is being cruel to be kind. He argues that when she visits every day it hurts him because it is a reminder of “what I will never do again.” Her presence is “torture” to him, despite her loving intentions. So, instead of providing him with positive feelings, her visits have the opposite effect. Ken will not even allow her to kiss him goodbye. She is upset and when she grabs her things to leave, she knocks over the vase of flowers she always brings and it crashes on the floor. It is a symbol of how their love has been dashed to pieces. 

 

Emerson scheduled Ken to see Mrs. Boyle (Kathryn Grody) and again Ken has no choice in the matter. He jokes that if he doesn’t see her, Emerson will “dissolve” the woman and “inject” her into him, as he makes a reference to how the doctor gave him the sedative without Ken’s consent. He tells Boyle he “used to be” Ken Harrison, as he now feels he is only a ghost of his prior self. She tries to counter his decision to not have any more treatment by noting how other artists who were nearly blind or crippled still did not give up. Boyle says he will be able to read and write with machines and express his artistic vision through teaching and creating poetry. He says you can’t just switch artistic abilities. He says his imagination “spoke” to him through his “fingers,” which cannot happen anymore. He is sarcastic and says he wants the first book he reads to deal with how to sculpt without hands, and be “Self-Taught.” She is ready to leave saying he isn’t ready for the present discussion, and he says she should treat him like a human being who wasn’t paralyzed and get angry at him for his rudeness instead of hiding behind professionalism. It is a form of condescension that makes him want to end his life even more.

 

Ken becomes so exasperated that he has a breathing spasm and John whisks him away to get some help. Ironically, he can’t die without the help of others, whose own impulses are to save him. John gets Ken to laugh at a joke, which allows Ken to enjoy living, if only for a moment. Scott shows up and Ken notes she has “amazing breasts.” She is a bit embarrassed, and he is funny when he says it isn’t the usual thing to say when only one of the persons is in the bed. He makes an interesting point about how relaxed a woman can be when there isn’t “a man around.” The implication is that he is not a sexual threat or someone to desire, so she is free to not be self-conscious. However, it just reinforces the loss of his own sexuality. He sees the sadness in his overcompensating with suggestive banter because of his body’s inability to perform sexually. He says the only reason her moral view of not letting him die bests his view is that “you’re more powerful than me. I am in your power.” It has nothing to do with the merits of the situation from his perspective. 

 

Ken requested the automobile insurance company’s lawyer, Carter Hill (Bob Balaban), to talk with him. He wants Hill to get him discharged from the hospital so that he can die by ending medical assistance. He can’t feed himself or drink without help, and it was noted earlier that he requires kidney dialysis. Hill is reluctant to accept the request, but Ken says that if lawyers represent those they know are guilty, then he should have the same rights of representation as “an axe murderer.” (It is interesting that Dreyfuss plays a lawyer representing Barbra Streisand’s character who is trying to prove she is mentally sound in the film Nuts).

 

The unsure Hill tells Ken that he wants to meet with Emerson first before representing Ken. But Emerson’s one-sided way of looking at things moves Hill toward arguing for Ken’s hospital discharge. Emerson says his duty is to preserve life which he feels outweighs Ken’s individual wishes. He says that Ken is in a state of depression and is incapable of making decisions about his life and death, and he shows hostility toward Hill’s participation in the matter. Hill says he will bring in his own psychiatrist to get an objective opinion as to Ken’s state of mind. Hill tells Ken that if Emerson can get two psychiatrists to agree that Ken is mentally unbalanced then Ken's hospitalization becomes an involuntary commitment. Others always seem to be deciding Ken’s fate.

 

Emerson meets with psychiatrist Sandy Jacobs (George Wyner) about Ken’s case as Scott walks in. Emerson’s old-fashioned belief is that wanting to commit suicide automatically means that a person is of unsound mind. Scott is outraged and she says, “Aren’t we talking about his life here.” Emerson says Ken’s decision violates medical responsibility. Thus, we have the basis for the title of the movie. Scott argues that Ken has lost his “privacy” and his “dignity,” and she wonders if she would want to go on living if she was in his position. So, she says just because Emerson disagrees with Ken it doesn’t make the patient mentally incompetent. She says that Emerson is not just acting like a doctor but also like a “judge.” The film does show how the legal and the medical worlds are sometimes at odds with each other. Seeing that Scott is partial to Ken’s thinking, Emerson threatens Scott with an autopsy if Ken dies and Emerson suspects there was an assisted suicide.

 

In the dialysis unit, Ken jokes with a young girl named Lissa (Abigail Hepner), saying he will be playing for the Boston Red Sox at the shortstop position. He then says actually he will just be wearing red socks. He is thrilled to hear that her treatments are being cut back and he probably sees a full life ahead for her. The short scene contrasts how medical treatment for some is hopeful and for others, hopeless.

 

Jacobs meets with Ken, who is very clever as he points out that medical knowledge about his condition helps him make a decision, but it’s still his decision. He likens doctors telling him what to do with a sculptor trying to determine what a client should buy. Jacobs says that Ken’s intelligence works against him because it shows he has more reasons to keep living. Ken points out the Catch-22 aspect of Jacobs’s argument, noting it states because he is intelligent enough to make decisions it shows he is too smart to warrant death. While they talk, Jacobs tidies up and folds a towel, and Ken points out the man’s obsessive-compulsive tendencies. It is funny, as the layman Ken becomes the diagnostician. 

 

Ken then has an interview with Hill’s psychiatrist, Dr. Barrows (Mel Stewart), and he continues to demonstrate his wit (as to tests, Ken assures him he is “rotten” at running the hundred-yard dash) and anger (mad about how conspiring doctors stick together while requiring him to prove he is sane, a difficult task for anyone). Barrows, like the other “professionals,” retreats when Ken responds in a perfectly normal emotional way instead of dealing with him on a basic human level. 

 

Scott goes to see Pat and observes the works of art Ken has created, which most likely makes her understand what he no longer can accomplish. Statues are immobile, but they can capture a moment of movement which Ken has done concerning Pat’s dancing talent. Pat holds up a piece of a hand. In a way it symbolizes his situation. Ken’s body is now like one of his works, frozen in time. Scott says that she is there to talk about a way to help Ken. But Pat has taken Ken’s words to heart. She talks about him as the “late Ken Harrison.” She is wrapping up his business affairs concerning selling and storing his work, as if it is part of an estate of someone who has passed away. She is also getting ready for a date, so she has accepted his demand that she move on. To Scott, Pat seems cold at first, but Pat says the real Ken is in his art, not in what remains in the hospital. She respects Ken and that is why she honored his wishes. She says if Scott respects the man, “Then just let him do what he wants to do.” 

 

Scott visits Ken after hours and she tells him that she went to his studio and admired his sculptures. She was going to place one of the works in his room but he says that instead she can have any one of the pieces she wants. She just so happens to really like the hand and she brought it with her. Ken says it is the best one, but not his. It is a representation of Michelangelo’s painting in the Sistine Chapel of God creating life. While they laugh because Scott is embarrassed about not recognizing the piece, the incident points to how the creation of something out of imagination is how an artist is god-like. She points out that he seems to be enjoying himself and he admits feeling human for the first time in a while, but he is sure he wants to end things. The film implies that there may be moments of enjoyment, but in the long run, such an extremely limiting life would be intolerable to someone who experienced existence so completely.

 To provide him with one of those fun instances, Orderly John and Nurse Mary Jo sneak Ken into the basement where John’s Jamaican band, The Rebel Rockers, perform for him and he smokes some marijuana with them. When a security guard hears them and the band runs out, the stoned Ken asks the guard, “Isn’t this dialysis?” It is an example of how well the script makes the heavy moments palatable with some comic relief.

 

Hill tells Ken the next day that he will represent him, and he says that instead of a competency hearing he wants to apply for a writ of habeas corpus. As Hill says, “It is against the law to deprive anyone of his liberty without due process.” So, if due process has not been provided, the person, or “body,” must be relinquished. Ken voices his variation on Shakespeare’s play title by saying, “All’s well that ends,” leaving off the final “well” to stress that his “end” will make things “all well” for him. 

 As he is wheeled into a room at the hospital for his hearing, John and Rodriguez will not wish him luck because they don’t want him to die, while others, such as Mary Jo, do. Even his own lawyer, Hill, said it was a case he wouldn’t mind losing. The disparity in opinions mirrors the population in general as to the split feelings about suicide due to incurable medical reasons. Judge Wyler (Kenneth McMillan) presides over the informal meeting. Emerson testifies that it is impossible to suffer such extensive injuries without mental trauma, and he concludes, although he is not a psychiatrist, that Ken is clinically depressed. Hill stresses that despite Emerson’s experience, he is not officially trained to justify his impression of Ken. The psychiatrist Barrows states that Ken is reacting in a normal manner to his circumstances, and is not clinically depressed. The attorney representing the hospital, Mr. Eden (Ward Costello), asks if Barrows thinks Ken is making the right decision to end his life. Even though the psychiatrist does not have to answer that question, he volunteers that he believes Ken is wrong in what he is trying to do. That, however, is a subjective impression, and does not contradict Barrow’s earlier statement that Ken is acting in a rational manner. Again, the question is who gets to choose concerning Ken’s life or death path? 

 

Wyler says he would like to ask Ken some “noninflammatory” questions. Ken’s sharp comment is that he would prefer “a hanging judge.” Wyler sees himself in that role no matter which way he rules, since Ken is in a no-win situation. It’s just a matter of which way to lose is worse. The physicians who side with Emerson’s opinion say that Ken is “not capable of making an informed, intelligent decision.” Ken refutes that decision, basically saying it has been used to support the doctors' desire to keep patients alive. Ken says he is already dead and wants that recognition. Ken argues against Wyler’s assertion that Ken is legally alive because life must “include the idea that it be self-supporting.” He states that he isn’t asking anyone to end his life, only to leave the hospital so he can die naturally. He emphasizes that his freedom of choice is being denied. But the decision to end his life comes so unnaturally to many people that they can only conclude that it is not a coherent decision, and they want no part in playing a role in what will lead to the end of a person’s existence, especially one that shows so much intelligence and wit. 

 

For Ken, staying in the hospital just to maintain his mind without any ability for him to control his life is an act of “cruelty.” He argues that is especially true for him because his work as an artist was the most important part of his life and only having his mind intact without being able to utilize his imagination has turned his consciousness into his “enemy,” which “tortures” him. He loved experiencing women and now he can’t tolerate their presence because it is so punishing not to be able to respond to them in any fulfilling way. He states he is in a state of “outrage” that they can decide to continue this hell just “because you cannot see the pain,” as it is in the mind and not the body. He says that he would like the same mercy one would show a mutilated animal on the road while at the same time not asking anyone to resort to an act of violence. Otherwise, in about five years Ken implies that they will see how they have damaged him irreparably.

 

Wyler needs time to deliberate and when he returns he cites cases that would allow for choosing one’s own destiny. He also states that if Ken is clinically depressed then he would not be able to make a rational decision. Wyler concludes that Ken is a brave and thoughtful man and is capable of making an informed choice. He rules that Ken should be allowed to end his hospital care. Ken is grateful while those who have become close to him have mixed reactions. Emerson says Ken can stay at the hospital without treatment so he can be around familiar surroundings and people until he passes away, which Ken agrees would be easier for him. But Emerson admits that he hopes Ken might change his mind.

 

John wheels him into his room and inserts some dark humor by pulling the sheet over Ken’s head, making him look like he is already a corpse, which makes Ken laugh. After John leaves, Scott enters and she strokes Ken’s face, but when she moves in to kiss him, he turns his head, pleading that she not continue, since it only emphasizes what he wants but can never have. She leaves in tears, and Ken is alone as the sounds of the hospital surround him, showing how life can go on for others. The last shot is of Michelangelo’s hand of God that perhaps here suggests that sometimes one’s life should be in one’s own hands.

The next film is The Stunt Man.

A Hard Day's Night

 SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed.

Roger Ebert notes in his book, The Great Movies, that A Hard Day’s Night (1964), “was in a different category from rock musicals that had starred Elvis and his imitators.” Indeed, those earlier films did not offer much more than a way to showcase their musical stars playing and singing their songs. But this Richard Lester directed movie, from a script written by Alun Owen, uses witty, surreal dialogue and situations that has The Beatles mirror the anarchic freedom of The Marx Brothers. 

 

Ebert notes that the black-and-white photography provides a “semi-documentary style” as the film follows a day in the life of the famous quartet as they evade zealous fans, rebel against those who would contain them, and eventually perform at a concert. As Ebert says, the film does not follow standard filmmaking procedures, and instead uses handheld cameras and quick cutting that make it appear as if the shots were “snatched during moments of real life.” But that realistic look is in ironic contrast to the absurd antics of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. 

 

The title of the film came from Ringo who was describing how rest was needed after a trying day being The Beatles. But it is writer Owen who created “stereotyped” versions of the band members, according to IMDb, after observing them on tour. He depicted Paul as “cute” and “sensible,” John as the “smart-ass,” George as “quiet and shy,” and Ringo as “dim-witted and sad.” In real life, the personalities of these individual musicians were more complex, so the film is a fictional version of the factual people. Larry David does the same thing in Curb Your Enthusiasm. 

 

The opening sequence, with the lively title track playing in the background, is one of movement. John, George and Ringo are fleeing from the adoring female fans. They run, jump, and ride to get away. Only Paul, in disguise with a beard and mustache sits still because he is with his grandfather (Wilfrid Brambell) on a bench. (IMDb notes that Paul was indisposed for a while because of a car accident, and William Shears was used as a stand-in. In Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Paul sings an introduction to the “one and only Billy Shears”). But they all meet up at a station to go on a train, another moving object. This sequence conveys youthful energy, but also a sense that the musical celebrities find it difficult to obtain that sense of liberation. Indeed, when they are not moving they are in confined areas, such as rooms, cars, and train compartments that symbolize how their fame, although allowing them monetary gain and the ability to express their musical abilities, also limited them as individuals.

 

On the train there is the first of many references to Paul’s grandfather being “very clean.” According to IMDb, the phrase is a reverse reference to actor Brambell’s role in a British TV series entitled “Steptoe and Son” (which was the inspiration for the American show “Sanford and Son”), where Brambell’s character was called a “dirty old man.” John says that they will probably have to look after the old man, but his response is, “I look after meself.” His attitude is unexpected since one would expect the old man to be a conservative type. But the script defies expectations, and Grandfather likes to get into mischief and is a rebel. Paul calls him “a villain, a real mixer.” Paul adds his grandfather, “costs you a fortune in breach-of-promise cases.” That type of dialogue is funny because it sounds formal coming from blokes who came off the streets of Liverpool. 

 

Shake (John Junkin) and Norm (Norman Rossington), the group's handlers, show up, and Norm immediately wants to put restrictions on the four, saying “let's not cause any trouble.” After Grandfather goes with Shake and Norm for some coffee, a proper looking middle-aged gentleman (Richard Vernon) enters the compartment. The long-haired boys seem to be an existential annoyance to the conservative man, as he views them with suspicion. He immediately tries to control the situation by closing the window (metaphorically implying he does not want fresh ways of thinking to be in his presence). Paul wants the window open, and John points out that the majority there doesn’t want it closed, stressing democracy. But the older fellow argues he has sway because he has been around longer, basically arguing that age outranks youth. He doesn’t want them playing rock music on Ringo’s radio, either. He says he “fought the war for your sort,” and Ringo’s funny response is, “I bet you’re sorry you won,” since the man is so hostile toward those he protected. The Marx Brothers influence at playing with language can be heard when the traveler says, “I shall call the guard,” and Paul says, “Ah, but what?” That response is followed by an absurd shot of the boys outside the train with a bicycle running alongside the man’s window, stressing that he is treating them like little children. 

 

The Beatles join Shake, Norm, and Grandfather in the dining car. Norm and Shake are arguing over the ridiculous point that Shake is acting taller than Norm. Paul discovers that it’s his grandfather that instigated the conflict, even though the two men never argue. Paul says that Grandfather doesn’t like “unity.” He’s being depicted as an anarchist, just the opposite of the elderly man in the compartment. Grandfather creates more chaos when young girls enter the car. Paul makes a move on them for himself and the others, but then Grandfather says the young men are convicts and the females should flee. In a way, The Beatles were guilty of defying conventional norms. 

 

Grandfather is unaccounted for, and when asked, John’s nutty comment is that he concealed him about his “person.” It adds to the film’s attack on conventional rationality. Ringo admits to George that he has an inferiority complex, and he plays drums because it’s his, “active compensatory factor.” Here we have more of that out-of-place language that sounds like curbside psychology, which the script is satirizing. John bursts into a compartment that has young girls and asks for a file to free him of supposed handcuffs, carrying on the theme of being in a confining state due to his celebrity status.

 

Paul and John find Grandfather with a much younger woman. He says he is engaged, another ridiculous moment. The next shot is Grandfather in a cage in the storage part of the train, looking like his free spirit has been imprisoned. But, the Beatles join him, so they, too, are confined by their own fame, as girls show up outside the barrier. We then have the artifice of the movie undermining the documentary feel, as the quartet plays “I Should Have Known Better,” when they are only supposed to be playing cards. 

 

The “surging” girls are waiting for them at the train station (John asks if he could be “surged,” which again echoes the Marx Brothers’ love of wordplay and also shows the plus side of being a rock star). More physical fleeing takes place suggesting an attempt to escape the suffocation of fame. Shake has to carry the band’s instruments because The Beatles don’t have the luxury of privacy to bring their own. But, for that sacrifice of privacy, they do experience adoration and the freedom to have others do work for them. The film shows the two sides of success. 

 

Ringo gets an invitation to go to a fancy club, but Norm, trying to control the band’s members so that they don’t become a publicity embarrassment, denies Ringo the opportunity to go. Grandfather steals the invitation, and even though he openly discourages attendance there, he likes the idea of being at a place that has “easy money and fast women.” Norm wants the band to stay in the hotel and answer their fan mail. After Norm leaves, John grabs his jacket to go out, which is his defiant response to being told to stay put, and they go out dancing to their own recorded music. Grandfather, exercising his own rebelliousness, goes gambling at the club. When he goes broke, he unscrupulously pretends to be a waiter and gets a large tip from a patron so he can continue to bet. There is a shot at the dance club that has a young woman resting her booted foot on the hand of a companion as John sits at the table. In Howard Hampton’s essay, “The Whole World is Watching,” this brief image conveys, “the way the cool and wry and fetishistic are all folded into everyday conversation, ordinary life.” It’s a hint of how The Beatles are in the vanguard of “a transformed social world that's being sculpted before your eyes.” However, Norm (an appropriate name for someone who wants things to adhere to the “norms” of behavior so that things appear to be “normal”), shows up and wants The Beatles to leave. 

 

Norm gets the lads back to the hotel to do the chore of answering their mail. But, they find the butler whose clothes Grandfather took to go to the fancy club, and they use that excuse to break away once more to find the old man. They get into the exclusive club because they are, after all, The Beatles, so celebrity has its privileges. Shake gets into the exclusive club by saying he’s “Ringo’s sister,” so absurdity keeps surfacing in the film.

 

The next scene has John enjoying himself as he plays like a child unencumbered by adult restrictions while taking a bath. He pretends he is a German U-Boat commander. As he sings, “Rule Britannia, Britannia rules the sea,” he then has one boat bash another, a sort of satiric jab at England’s imperialism. As IMDb points out, John holds a toy submarine and shouts out “Help!” which predicts the subsequent Beatles movies, Help! And Yellow Submarine. When Norm again tries to manage John by telling him to get out of the bathtub, he pulls the stopper, but only John’s hat and the toy submarine remain after the water drains. John walks in harassing Norm to stop fooling around. It’s an absurdist reversal of their roles. 

 

The band rides to a press conference at the theater where they will perform. When they exit the car they go through a homeless person’s tent and the screaming female fans knock the shelter away, leaving the poor man without his covering. The shot seems to stress how all this fame and money contrasts with the poor people who are left behind in the capitalistic rat race. 

 

When the musicians enter the reception room, Norm continues his restrictive role by trying to curtail the band’s efforts to indulge in any alcoholic beverages. The film also makes fun of the same tired questions that reporters ask The Beatles. Commenting supposedly about the size of Ringo’s nose, John says, “I never noticed his nose till about six months ago.” When asked how he found “America,” John’s sarcastic response is, “Turn left at Greenland.” When confronted with the extremely obvious question, “Has success changed your life,” George does not dignify the question as he simply says, “Yes.” When asked what he calls the hairstyle he has, George says, “Arthur,” again playing with language. When an interviewer wants to know with whom Ringo identifies between the two warring youthful factions in England at the time, the “mods” or the “rockers,” Ringo’s famous line is “I’m a mocker.” The response shows how he makes fun of the question and the conflicting parties, but also how he implies the best way to resolve differences is through unification. Paul has to keep saying that he is just “good friends” with all the suggestions of romantic connections, which shows how he must publicly comment on all his private social activities. Despite the supposedly factual presentation of the narrative, there are references to the mothers of John and Paul, who, in fact, were deceased at the time of the filming. So, the movie is playing with fact versus fiction.  

 

As the group goes to the stage for rehearsal, one of the crew taps on Ringo’s symbols, which upsets his sense of musical jurisdiction. George says Ringo is very fussy about his drums because “they loom large in his legend.” It’s another instance of exaggerated word usage to poke fun at the group’s own fame. Even after they perform a perfect version of “If I Fell,” the band receives flak from a snobby TV director (Victor Spinetti), another uppity older person wanting to control them after being urged on by that “mixer,” Grandfather McCartney. 

 Norm wants to lock them away until the performance, but of course they get out through the fire escape as the energetic “Can’t Buy Me Love” plays. What follows is a frenetic rambling by the four as they luxuriate in their freedom in a sports field. The shots from above emphasize the extent of the open-air lack of restrictions. The use of fast-action and slow-motion camera work adds to the playful kinetic liberation. As soon as the song is done, another old-timer enters trying to ground their flight to freedom, saying the area is private property and therefore off-limits.

 George accidentally passes by an office where people in the fashion industry work. They think his look is close enough to a real Beatle that they can use him to sell their goods. Exploitation of The Beatles brand is what is suggested here, with the company employees not able to recognize genuine talent from imitators. George describes certain shirts as “grotty,” which means grotesque. IMDb says the clothing is similar to what the Dave Clark Five wore, the inferior band that followed The Beatles in what was known in the recording industry as “The British Invasion.” The fashion executive says that no matter how “grotty” it appears, the corporate world will make kids want it or else the youths will feel diminished in the eyes of their peers. He says the new trend will be “to care passionately and be right wing.” It’s a sort of indoctrination to gain control, and the individualistic George wants nothing to do with it. He says that their “trendsetter” female spokesperson is a “drag” and people make fun of her. George is thrown out because the fashion boss only wants affirmation of his preconceived views.

 

When the band members return to their ready room, they are again chastised by Norm for wandering off. John gets on his knees and jokingly begs not to be “caned,” for being “led astray,” a jab at the English boarding school system that overreacted by using corporal punishment if a boy broke the rules. The tailor is measuring Paul who walks away, and John cuts the tape measure and mocks the Queen by using a high-pitched voice, saying, “I now declare this bridge open.” It’s another bit of rebellious humor that pokes fun at the reigning establishment. 

 

They get more disapproving and controlling static from the Director because the band isn’t on time to practice another tune and he wants them not to move “out of position” once they take the stage. They make fun of his sweater, saying he probably doesn't have a wife because he has such bad taste in clothes. Paul says that the Director’s assistant probably knitted the sweater for him, and then John says, “She knitted him.” It’s a damning line, associating the man in authority with an old-fashioned practice because he can’t keep pace with how the world is changing. 

 

After a marvelous rendition of “And I Love Her,” they go to the makeup room to make fun of the established order. Ringo is under a dryer as he wears the hairy headgear of a Buckingham Palace guard while he reads a magazine entitled The Queen as John points out that it’s an “in-joke.” Paul drapes a protective shroud around him like a classical actor and mockingly quotes from Hamlet as he says, “Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt.” John sports a beard and satirizes a proper gentleman as he mentions shopping at the famous British luxury department store, Harrods, which is situated where “you turn right at the corridor and past the fireplace.” Before going back on stage, John does some exaggerated dance moves to jokingly comment on the traditional way some dancers are performing their rehearsal. Everything about this movie is iconoclastic.

 

After another song, Norm wants the band to stay put at the theater, but John and Paul are as defiant as ever, and go off with a couple of girls. Norm assigns Ringo to look after Paul’s grandfather, who continues to stir up trouble by harassing Ringo about reading a book instead of going out in the world and living it up. Grandfather keeps playing the part of rulebreaker, as he critiques traditional scholarly pursuits. But he also exploits the teasing Ringo receives from the other Beatles, saying they are taking advantage of his “good nature.” He convinces Ringo to go “parading,” and Ringo takes off right before the show, causing the others to attempt to retrieve him. 

 As Ringo walks about, two girls recognize him and he escapes into a shop where he puts on a coat and hat so he can’t be recognized. Disguised, he then approaches a girl who calls him “shorty” and dismisses him. As an abstract celebrity he is pursued, but as himself, he is rejected, which is a cynical comment on the nature of fame. He tries to take what we now call a selfie by mounting his camera on a rock. When he uses an extension cord to trip the shutter, the camera shoots off into the river. It’s the kind of loser gag Woody Allen will later put to good use. When Ringo chucks a large brick into the river, a cop rides by on a bicycle and reprimands Ringo. It’s another example of too much control being exerted. But then Ringo becomes the old guard when a young boy (David Janson) rolls a tire and Ringo trips on it. The Beatles’ drummer then tells the boy he is causing trouble. The youth has skipped school as part of his rebelliousness. Ringo discovers the boy has three friends (just like Ringo) who also are playing hooky, and Ringo says he, too, is a “deserter.” So, Ringo sees some of himself in the young boy. 

 Ringo continues to play the screenwriter’s lame character as he has to pay for stale food and disrupts men playing some pub games. He even gets his glass of beer smashed by putting it down in the wrong place. He almost hits a parrot with a dart and spears a patron’s sandwich. He’s seen as a “troublemaker” and when he gets thrown out of the pub and kicks some trash onto the street, a policeman is there, of course, sternly observing these minor infractions. But when Ringo tries to be chivalrous by putting his coat over puddles of water for a woman to walk over, he accidentally has her fall into a manhole. Luckily, there is a worker who breaks her fall, but it’s enough for the cop to arrest Ringo.

 

Meanwhile, Grandfather forged the signatures of the bandmates on a bunch of Beatles photos and tries to pass them off as genuine to the crowd in front of the theater. After causing a commotion, he too is arrested. He rants about police brutality and kicks the policemen at the station. He says he is “a soldier of the Republic,” which IMDb notes refers to the I.R.A. So, Grandfather is associated with a radical group of Irishmen who fought against British dominance. We therefore have more insurrectionist references. The police say they just tried to protect him from the mob of girls, but Grandfather runs off, just like the band members were doing. 

 

After Grandfather sneaks into the theater and tells John, Paul, and George that Ringo is at the police station, the film has a modern version of a wacky Keystone Cops segment as the officers and the musicians run about while the appropriately fast-paced “Can’t Buy Me Love” plays. While the cops chase the four young men, they overlook a thief trying to break into a car, stressing the authorities lack of fair law enforcement, as one oblivious cop uses the crook in the stolen auto to chase the quartet.

 

The film ends with a concert that showcases what The Beatles do best, play their songs. The music and harmonies are wonderful, and their compositions continued to evolve into greatness. The uninhibited fans show that they allowed no restraints to be placed upon this younger generation. After the concert the band members are running again, as they did at the onset of the movie, refusing to be contained. They fly off on a helicopter, symbolizing their deserved place among the musical heavens.

The next film is Whose Life Is It Anyway?