Get Back: a marathon documentary that brings the Beatles back to life

At almost eight hours, Peter Jackson’s three-part documentary about the Beatles is “a completist superfan marathon”, said Barbara Ellen in The Observer. Sanctioned by Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, it is made from 150 hours of audio, and 60 hours of footage that were recorded during the making of Let It Be half a century ago. Using the same “restorative technology” as he used for his First World War film They Shall Not Grow Old, Jackson brings the Fab Four back to life, capturing their intensity and musicianship, while delivering amply on “band politics and aggro”.

Get Back can “feel like a schlep”, said Alexis Petridis in The Guardian: with lots of chit-chat, and repetition, there’s a point when the prospect of hearing another version of Don’t Let Me Down

“becomes an active threat to the viewer’s sanity”. Still, there are some “fantastic moments”, and the film gives interesting insight into the tensions in the band. “Harrison is alternately surly and prickly, as you might be if you brought in a song as good as All Things Must Pass and got a lukewarm reception”; Lennon is “joylessly” off his head; and in his attempts to “jolly things along, McCartney keeps slipping into passive-aggressive wheedling”. Yet you never feel they’re at each other’s throats, said Ed Cumming in The Independent. And often, they’re having fun. The Beatles have become so much a part of popculture history we forget they were real people; yet here they are, “four young blokes smoking, chatting” and “mucking around on guitars”.