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Backbeat (1994)

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15 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :-
My favorite movie !, 15 February 2001

Author: Tomasz Jedralski (tomasz_jedralski@poczta.fm) from Katowice, Poland

Softley's 'Backbeat' is my favorite movie I've ever seen. I'm a huge Beatles fan and I've watched many biographical films about The Fab Four like 'Birth of Beatles' for example, and I must admit that this production from 1993 is the best of them all. This picture shows us the Hamburg's episode (early 60s) of Beatles career and it concentrates on relationship between John Lennon (fantastic play by Ian Hart) and Stuart Sutcliffe (aka The Lost Beatle). Lots of laughs, lots of tears and above all - great music ! A must seen for Beatles fans.

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9 out of 11 people found the following comment useful :-
The Pre-Beatles Show, 15 March 1999
Author: Quentin-12 from Ontario

Finally we see the side to the Beatles that no one really knew - what happened before and what they were before. Stephen Dorff gives off another simply brilliant performance as Stuart - the man who could have been but never cared enough he was "Just along for a few laughs". Being a Beatles fan I've always been interested in their personal lives and this movie gets more personal than any documentary or news reel could. As to how true the events are I'm not sure but it was a definitely enjoyable movie.

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8 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
A Beatle fan's dream come true., 16 May 1999

Author: Hermit C-2 from Marietta, GA, USA

There's no doubt in my mind that 'Backbeat' is the best movie ever made about the Beatles. Dare I utter such blasphemy-- it may even be better than 'A Hard Day's Night!'

Director Iain Softley (his first film!) and his co-writers chose a period and a time that have always held a lot of romance for the group's fans, their trial-by-fire apprenticeship in the seedy nightclubs of Hamburg, Germany c. 1960. This was the crucible in which the band was transformed from noisy amateurs to professionals ready to take on- and change- the world. The focus is on two young friends from Liverpool, John Lennon (Ian Hart) and Stuart Sutcliffe (Stephen Dorff). (As a critic once noted, dead men don't file lawsuits.) Stuart is a sensitive lad with a great talent for painting. John is a cynic with a very large chip on his shoulder. He may be sensitive and intellectual, too, but he'd rather die than admit that to anyone. His artistic passion is expressed in the rock & roll music he's driven to play. Stu likes the image more than the music, so he buys a bass guitar, turns his back on a promising art career and joins the band. The fact that he can barely play his instrument is not lost on bandmate Paul McCartney (Gary Bakewell.)

Playing a backbreaking schedule in Hamburg they meet up with two young Germans who become important in their lives- Klaus Voorman (Kai Wiesinger) and especially Astrid Kirchherr (Sheryl Lee), two "exi's", sort of latter-day beatniks or early hippies. Stu and Astrid fall in love and John is both irritated and fascinated by her. Soon Stu has to choose between his love for Astrid and painting and his deep emotional ties to John and the band.

The actors portraying the most well-known characters (Hart, Bakewell and Chris O'Neill as George Harrison) all bear striking resemblances to their look in the early '60's. But this movie not only gets the style right, but the substance as well. Paul McCartney has said it was full of inaccuracies (like John singing "Long Tall Sally," always Paul's number) but as an avid Beatles fan since 1964 my view is that it's a very honest portrayal. Ian Hart shines in his evocation of the complicated personality and tortured soul of John Lennon. He practically looks like a twin of John's son Julian. Sheryl Lee also stands out as the super-cool Astrid in a restrained but powerful performance. The musical performances are fine, too, done by a band including Mike Mills of R.E.M. No Beatle originals are used in the movie but that's OK because at the time they were mostly playing powerful cover versions of American rock and soul. In fact the "B word" is not seen or uttered except once, just before the film's conclusion.

This movie is a triumph for all involved and even though it's not "official" it will only add to the great legacy left by the Beatles.

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6 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
The Licensed Poets, 27 February 2007

Author: loza-1

A film which concentrates on the short musical and artistic career of Stuart Sutcliffe, the Scottish-born bass player from the days when the Beatles were a quintet playing the Reeperbahn of Hamburg, and his love affair with the German artist Astrid Kircherr.

I suppose there are two types of people who will watch this film: those who know little or nothing about the Beatles's time in Hamburg, and those who do. The former will probably enjoy the film for what it is; the latter will find it annoying. I am sorry to say that I am in the latter camp. There are so many historical inaccuracies that it is hardly worth listing them. The most annoying to me was the placing of the recording of "My Bonnie" before Stuart Suttcliffe had left the band. I thought that was totally unnecessary. Another inaccuracy is depicting Paul McCartney trying to kick Suttcliffe out of the band so that he could take over the bass. Also, the length of Astrid's hair is based on a self photograph of hers. Contemporary photographs show her with shoulder length hair.

As well as the Beatles themselves, who walk onstage and start to play without plugging their guitars in, the film also features the real life characters Astrid Kirchherr, Cynthia Powell Lennon and Klaus Voormann, who are named, and Bruno Koschmidder and Tony Sheridan, who are not.

Since John Lennon and Stuart Sutcliffe are dead, the film makers can imply that the pair had homosexual feelings for one another and not get sued.

The rest of the Beatles are reduced to one dimensional cutouts: the serious one, the quiet one, the cipher.

That's what the film got wrong. Let us see what the film got right.

When you look at an historical film - especially one that covers a period within living memory - one can find lots of anachronisms with the fashions of the time. Normally I will home in on half a dozen things that were not around in 1960/61. Not in this film. The shooting and direction - apart from the little melodrama at Sutcliffe's death - was good, and the scene where Sutcliffe spazzed out and threw red paint all over the bathroom was excellent, the red paint signifying blood, as though a murder had been committed.

But alas the scriptwriters were not up to the same standard as the wardrobe department, the cameramen, the musicians and the director, and I found titles of Beatles songs yet to be written, like "Hard Day's Night" and "Eight Days a Week," being worked into the script utterly ridiculous. What were the scriptwriters trying to do?

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6 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Prehistory, 18 February 2006
Author: dbdumonteil

This is an excellent depiction of the Beatles ' Hamburg days .But the movie's real heroes are actually Sutcliffe,Lennon and Astrid.The movie was made some years after Goldman's infamous book and there are hints at a homosexual relation between John and Stu ("you're jealous of me!"Astrid would have said to John!) but the director does not insist and he finally depicts a true friendship.He pits Stu's down-to-earth world against Astrid's chic elitist intellectual one : they go to the pictures to see Melville's "Les enfants terribles" (actually a Cocteau story),and she seems to be very fond of the French culture:Cocteau,Sartre ,Edith Piaf ,Rimbaud,;and she was ahead of her time since fifteen years later,rock singer Patti Smith had the same idols.The scenarists also sketch a parallel between the Klaus Voorman/Astrid relationship and "les enfants terribles" Ian Hart is an excellent John Lennon,in turn cynical,violent,delicate,nasty,hateful;Gary Bakewell resembles Paul,but he is not given a single moment to shine ;as for Georges ,he is completely insignificant.The music is very exciting .Even when Stu (Dorff) sings his ditty in a gleeful croak ,it's rock and roll ! At the end of the movie,the dialog begins to ring false.Everybody acts as if the Beatles were to become huge ;at the time ,who could have predicted such a career?It's a rebuilding of history a posteriori.And if the final lines about Astrid,Stu and Klaus are useful,those about the Beatles are overkill:everybody knows that they were the biggest group of all time.

A must for Beatles' fans anyway.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
A long, long time ago, in a country not too far away..., 2 April 2006

Author: Lee Eisenberg (eisenberg.lee@gmail.com) from Portland, Oregon, USA

I think that it's especially appropriate that "Backbeat" was released right after the 30th anniversary of the Beatles coming to America: everyone was remembering them, and then a really good movie shows their early days. Specifically, it focuses on when they went to Hamburg and met artsy photographer Astrid Kirchherr. I should identify that this movie is for mature audiences only: aside from the language and sex, it shows how John, Paul, George, Pete, and Stu got addicted to speed so that they could keep playing; as a result, they got little sleep and their eyes got all glassy as they laid awake.

A really effective scene is right after Stu leaves the Beatles. Hoping to devote his life to art, he goes out and gets all drunk. Around this time, East Germany's government erects the Berlin Wall. Watching it on TV, Astrid and Klaus hold hands to be supportive of each other. When Stu sees this, he gets all violent. This scene - possibly more than any other in the movie - shows his mental breakdown.

All in all, a great movie. We also see that they first met Ringo in Hamburg. I'm sure that we'll all be remembering "Backbeat" for years to come. Rock on, lads!

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1 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
comments from not a Beatle devotee, 4 January 2008

Author: Jay Harris (sirbossman6969@yahoo.com) from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I have never been a real big fan of the Beatles, & know very little about there music or themselves,

I do know films & also know that very rarely do they ever tell the truth about any performing artist.

This is a film about before the time these late teen-agers became the Beatles, & about Stuart Sutcliffe (he co-founded the group with John Lennon), Stuarts story is sad BUT the music is first rate.

The acting by Stephen Dorff & Ian Hart as Sutcliffe & Lennon are first rate, More than likely inaccurate, BUT this is a movie. Sheryl Lee is quite good as Stu's love interest.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie I just may have to "googleize' the truth, from Google, & we all know they are not the most accurate source. This is from 1994 & I am finally seeing it. I am glad I did.

Ratings ***1/2 (Out of 4) 93 points (out of 100) IMDb 9 (out of 10)

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Much better than expected., 20 January 2007

Author: tonybirchwood from leeds, england

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

As a huge Beatles fan this movie was actually much better than i had expected. Not sure how accurate all the smaller details were but it seemed to capture the raw energy of the early Beatles years and depicted very well just how unpleasant much of the that time must have been - a far cry from the sterile manufactured pop industry today. I really enjoyed the dialogue, interaction between the characters and the music even though there was no room for a genuine Beatles number. Whilst a massive Beatles fan generally in particular I am a massive fan and have huge respect for John Lennon as probably the greatest popular musician of all time. When you bear in mind his childhood and family background it should come as no surprise that he was such a tortured soul and, as one of the other comments puts it "had such a chip on his shoulder". We are just lucky that this manifested itself in his incredible writing and soulful singing (surely he has the most underrated voice ever - just listen to Mr Moonlight (Beatles for Sale)or it's only love if (help) you don't agree). My overriding thought at the end of this movie was just how close Stuart Sutcliffe and Lennon were and thus what a massive impact his death must have had on him. Very sad but generally an enjoyable uplifting movie. A must for all Beatles fans and pretty good entertainment for anyone else.

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Great movie...but they don't SOUND like the Beatles!, 17 May 2002
Author: Alison (aliseliz@hotmail.com) from Preston, MO, USA

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I really enjoyed this film, but I just had a little trouble with the music. It was truly terrific, but Dave Pirner sounds nothing like Paul McCartney by any stretch of the imagination, nor does Greg Dulli sound anything remotely like John Lennon. I thought it was great that they used such well-known and talented musicians as Thurston Moore and Dave Grohl, but couldn't they have found somebody that sounded a little bit more like Lennon and McCartney? Ok, enough about that. I didn't know the whole story about Stuart Sutcliffe, and I had no idea that *SPOILER* he died. That was awful. But I really enjoyed learning more about one of my favorite bands, especially since I completely missed out on their heyday. (John Lennon died about six months before I was born! Oh, the agony!) I really didn't know much about the early days of the band, so this movie was very informative. I thought all the actors looked incredibly like their real-life counterparts. I had already see Ian Hart portray Lennon in The Hours and the Times, so I knew his characterization of Lennon was awesome, and made me enjoy his performance in Backbeat all the more. I highly recommend this film to all Beatles fans and anyone interested in rock 'n' roll history.

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3 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Simply one of the best films I have ever seen..., 7 January 2006

Author: jase_stevens from United Kingdom

It's difficult to come up with the superlatives enough to describe a film such as "Backbeat"; a film that grabbed me from the first moment I saw it and has never let go. It is a film that has everything, from great acting, great music and great dialogue, right down to the underpinning love story between John, Astrid and Stuart. Ian Hart is a revelation as Lennon, which detracts the attention from equally superb performances from Stephen Dorff and Sheryll Lee. Certainly Dorff has not bettered his performance in this since. If you haven't seen this film, and whether you have or have not any interest in the Beatles, then get it on video or DVD now. 10/10.

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