There’s a little bit of each Beatle in all of us, or probably should be.
Peter Jackson does love a good epic trilogy … and so, now, do Beatles fans. When it was announced in June that a change in plans for Jackson’s “Get Back” documentary was afoot, and it was now going to be three times as long as originally announced — a three-part streaming docuseries on Disney Plus, instead of a single theatrical feature Excerpt from Variety, to read the full article click here
“When I first met with Apple, they were just wrapping up ‘Eight Days a Week’ with Ron Howard,” he says, recalling the 2016 doc about the Beatles’ final tours in the mid-‘60s. “And so when we talked about doing something with the outtakes from ‘Let It Be,’ a theatrical film was certainly the plan going in.
Jackson joined Variety for an episode of “Doc Dreams,” presented by National Geographic, to discuss everything from the changing target lengths of his edits over the last four years of work to which Beatle he relates to most
[columns]
[column size="1/2"]
[/column]
[column size="1/2"]
[/column]
[/columns]
Then when I started working on it with Jabez (Olssen, his editor), we had 130 or140 hours of audio and 60-odd hours of video footage, and so we thought, ‘Let’s at least just get it down to something that we can manage.’ That’s when the 18-hour cut happened” — no, that’s not a typo — “but the plan was to keep going and make it two and a half hours.
And then the pandemic happened.” In March 2020, Disney knew a fall theatrical run was not in the cards and decided to bump it a year. That gave Jackson and Olssen another year to edit, which they gladly took. But rather than keep whittling, they went back into the rushes and were even finding great bits they’d overlooked in making that first 18-hour cut, even as they whittled away at the bulk of it.
“And we ended up with six hours, at the beginning of this year, maybe, or towards the end of last year,” Jackson says. “And so then the moment came where we just thought, ‘How on earth did we get it any shorter than this?’ Because at that point, you’re starting to commit a crime against rock ‘n’ roll history if you start trimming any more out, because there’s stuff there that people have to see. They haven’t seen it (yet) in 50 years
“We had to then own up to Disney and to the Beatles, to Apple Corps, that we thought the film should be six hours long, not two and a half,” he continues. They got back a polite “Show it to us”
The Beatles were the ones that we were waiting for them to look at it –Ringo (Starr) and Paul (McCartney) and Olivia (Harrison) and Sean (Lennon) — and the verdict came back from them saying: ‘Six hour — great. We understand why it’s six hours. We’re happy with a six-hour version.’” (Shhh — don’t tell anybody, but the version that’s premiering on Disney Plus over three nights this Thanksgiving actually runs closer to eight.)
“Look at the mathematics of it,” he says. “Just to explain: We’re telling the story of 22 days. On the second-to-last day, we’ve got the rooftop concert in its entirety” — and it was a given that, no matter what the length or format, showing fans that, unexpurgated, was a given. “That’s 45 minutes. So if you (have) a two-and a half hour feature film, and then you’re saying, ‘We’re going to tell it day by day,’ what’s the mathematics of each of the rest of these days? You realize the mathematics is, you’ve got somewhere between two and three minutes per day. And suddenly, it just seemed insane.
In December 2017, McCartney came to New Zealand on tour, and was invited backstage to discuss the project. “I had an iPad, and so I went into the dressing room and shook his hand and said, ‘So, Paul, I’ve seen all the outtakes from “Let It Be.”’ I could see the nervousness on his face… I mean, he was there in 1969, but he hadn’t seen the footage. And he said, ‘…yeah?’ And I could see there was trepidation on his face. I just said, ‘Look, whatever you think it is, it’s not what you think it is. Because I thought it was going to be miserable, but I’m amazed at how funny and happy it is. It’s completely different to what imagined.’ … He said, ‘Yeah? What? Really?’ And then I started showing him things on an iPad. … And then I went to L.A. a couple of times and showed Ringo things. And I started to ease them into the idea of the ‘Let It Be’ experience was not what they remember. “
DISCLAIMER: the images used by Videomuzic are for the purpose of criticism and exercise of the right to report news, in low quality, in compliance with the provisions of the law on copyright, used exclusively for the information content.
DISCLAIMER: Videomuzic usa le immagini per finalità di critica ed esercizio del diritto di cronaca in modalità degradata conforme alle prescrizioni della legge sul diritto d'autore utilizzate ad esclusivo corredo dei contenuti informativi.
The Beatles were the ones that we were waiting for them to look at it –Ringo (Starr) and Paul (McCartney) and Olivia (Harrison) and Sean (Lennon) — and the verdict came back from them saying: ‘Six hour — great. We understand why it’s six hours. We’re happy with a six-hour version.’” (Shhh — don’t tell anybody, but the version that’s premiering on Disney Plus over three nights this Thanksgiving actually runs closer to eight.)
“Look at the mathematics of it,” he says. “Just to explain: We’re telling the story of 22 days. On the second-to-last day, we’ve got the rooftop concert in its entirety” — and it was a given that, no matter what the length or format, showing fans that, unexpurgated, was a given. “That’s 45 minutes. So if you (have) a two-and a half hour feature film, and then you’re saying, ‘We’re going to tell it day by day,’ what’s the mathematics of each of the rest of these days? You realize the mathematics is, you’ve got somewhere between two and three minutes per day. And suddenly, it just seemed insane.