The act of creation is messy.
It's beautiful and repulsive. It can be all of those things. unpredictability and magic are the only constants and they are always a stray idea or offhand remark. The Beatles: Get Back is a document that defies the idea of a process.
Peter Jackson's trilogy of Disney+ documentaries takes almost eight hours to complete, which is almost as long as the Lord of the Rings series. The final word on The Beatles' demise as a band has been the recording sessions for Let It Be. It turns out that the reality is not so simple.
The Beatles' final album release and final studio recording, Abbey Road, have long been viewed as the breaking point in their eight-year journey together. That belief was based on a 1970 documentary by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, which depicts acrimony between the band members.
Jackson's take is a more complete perspective than a remake. Lindsay-Hogg spent more than 60 hours on his documentary. Get Back presents a full picture because of its running time alone.
It's more than that. The vaulted studio footage that Jackson saw painted a different picture of the Let It Be sessions than anyone outside The Beatles organization had ever seen. Get Back says that this wasn't where The Beatles ended. Four friends are trying to make their collaboration work one more time. The recording made the work of building the next Beatles album more difficult, but the day-to-day work was more joyful and playful.
The Apple Corps is a credit.
Get Back says it all. Jackson doesn't use narration or talking heads in favor of a cinema vérité approach that lets the footage roll with as little authorial interference as possible. Intercut archival clips and occasional subtitles build out the context to make a point. You will know when you hear a performance that made the final album cut. Jackson is more of a curator than a director.
He didn't shoot the footage, and he didn't bother with it at all. He pored over the hours and hours of material collected by Lindsay-Hogg's team and teased out the Beatles story that unfolded organically in the month of January 1969.
Get Back charts the creation of Let It Be, using the helpful framing device of days being crossed off a calendar to count down to the band's famed rooftop concert, where several final versions of the album's tracks were recorded. It's not always clear, but that's reality for you. John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr were at their most productive on some days when they were firing on all cylinders. Even the dull moments have energy.
Part 1's lightning bolt moment, where we get to see Paul work out the foundation of "Get Back" at the first moment the song took shape, will be talked about a lot. The scene shows Paul sitting with George and Ringo while his bandmates wait for John to show up.
Paul's strumming is just ambient noise. As Paul scats along in the rough cadence of the song's lyrics, the basic chord progression of "Get Back" slowly surfaces. While he is playing, George and Ringo start to get into a rhythm as they start to tune in.
Paul is working out the foundation of "Get Back" at the very beginning.
There are many different types of lightning bolt moments that can be found across Get Back. After "Get Back" is born, an extended back-and-forth between Paul and John, not an argument so much as a friendly-but-firm exchange of ideas about how to approach a particular number, ends with George almost off-handedly telling the group.
The seemingly apocalyptic development, which was never chronicled in the original Let It Be documentary, is an unlikely step in the creative process. One of the few substantive conversations between Paul and John about their roles within The Beatles was caused by George's sudden exit. George isn't gone for long. The band's continued work on Let It Be is affected by the shakeup created by his departure.
The Beatles' process is influenced by outside influences. John's then-girlfriend, Ono, who has been demonized as a key player in driving the band's demise, is a fixture in most scenes. She doesn't try to force herself into the process. The rest of the band is nice to her. We can see some of the tension John felt as he tried to reconcile his feelings for Ono with his feelings for his bandmates.
The course of Let It Be is shaped by other players. Lindsay-Hogg sometimes finds himself at odds with the group as he pitches wild ideas for the band's first-time-in-years live performance, which was set to mark the end of the recording sessions. There is plenty of time devoted to how George Martin, Mal Evans, and Billy Preston, who provided Let It Be's keyboard tracks, touched it in their own way.
It always comes back to The Beatles. The revelations that come out of Get Back's every frame paint a picture of four emotionally complex individuals who have been through it together. It's easy to forget that The Beatles were the first band to break into the pop charts.
The Apple Corps is a credit.
The first time they visited America, they were in their 20s. These not-quite-adults knew an intense kind of celebrity for a long time before they stopped performing live. Their interests and impulses carried them in different directions. They didn't know they were going to break up when they recorded Let It Be. The cracks that ended The Beatles were already there. They are plain to see in Get Back. Jackson doesn't shy away from the more difficult moments during the recording sessions; it drills into them as deeply as possible.
The picture is painted in grey. Even during the dicier exchanges, there's so much love in every studio moment. Let It Be may have been built under duress at times, but Get Back shows how much of that process was a generous exchange of ideas between strong yet respectful creative people.
This isn't an easy thing to watch, and not just for the occasional acrimony. The first two parts of Get Back clock in close to three hours. Jackson has a clear day-by-day structure that is easy to follow, but that doesn't mean each day is coherent or narratively fulfilling.
The more shapeless moments in Get Back are part of the appeal for a Beatles nut. The Beatles were an enigmatic bunch in their day, particularly during the later years of their time together. John, Paul, George, and Ringo are shown as humans in Get Back. There are a lot of people goofing around. Discuss what to eat. There were furtive eye rolls. The cinema vérité approach makes viewers feel like they are in a studio with the Beatles. This is a treasure trove of information for the dedicated fan. It won't hit everyone like that.
'Get Back' shows how much of the creation of 'Let It Be' was a generous exchange of ideas between strong yet respectful creative people.
It's difficult to keep up with what's happening if you're dipping in and out, and the commitment required to sit through even one part of Get Back is fairly daunting. This is what Beatles fans of the world want to see. Get Back was originally conceived as a feature-length film. One wonders if that shorter version may be a tighter alternative to Jackson's three-part smorgasbord.
The Beatles will perform their final live show on the roof of their recording studio in London in the third part of the production. Jackson has enough cameras to give him enough coverage to show different angles on the band and to capture the reactions of Londoners as the music plays on. The entire performance is delivered by Get Back, covering five different songs.
It's not as emotional for the band as it is for the viewer, because they seem happy to be done with the hardest part of Let It Be. The seven hours leading up to that electric moment are necessary to really sell it, and the concert lands like a gut punch. This is The Beatles, for better and for worse, in all their glory.
The first part of Get Back will be on Disney+ in three parts.
