Magical Mystery Tour revisited

It was with some trepidation that I sat down to watch 'Magical Mystery Tour' screened on BBC2 on Saturday night. My disappointment upon watching it on Boxing Day in 1967 was still too fresh in my mind. Yes, even after forty five years!

I can now report that my worries were unfounded. It actually wasn't too bad.

Why the difference I wondered. Well, to start with, this was the first time that I viewed the film as it was meant to be - in colour. And what a difference that made. The sequences for 'Flying' and 'Blue Jay Way' simply did not work in black and white which was how I originally saw them in 1967.

Then perhaps the difference may have been down to my expectations. In 1967 I expected everything The Beatles did to be brilliant. Look what else they did in that year. 'Sgt. Pepper', 'Penny Lane', 'Strawberry Fields Forever' and 'All You Need is Love'. On Saturday night my expectations based upon my original experience of the film were very low indeed.

Of course the film was also very much of its time. In retrospect we now look back at that period with a degree of fondness. The very idea of a magical mystery tour was so very British and so much a product of the 50's and 60's. Back then fewer people owned cars and so a coach trip was a way for working class families to get out of the city for a day. Crates of beer would be stowed in the coach and everyone would 'enjoy' a good singsong on the journey. This had been part of growing up for the individual members of The Beatles and so the film represented a little bit of a backward glance at their own lives. And why not? They were at that time clearly searching for some other meaning in their lives. Their success when it came, came fast and left them little or no time for reflection. Hence their involvement with the Maharishi and with their increased use of drugs such as cannabis and LSD. They had also had their first collective close hand experience of death when they lost their manager Brian Epstein soon before filming began. Such things tend to make people look back at their own lives and the film does include things which The Beatles had enjoyed in their own younger days. And let's not forget that in 1967 they themselves were only still in their mid 20's.

It is true that there was no plot to the film and by their own admission, the script was made up as they went along. The film has the quality of a home movie and there were clear signs that The Beatles were far more comfortable in front of the camera than behind it. Yet now, viewed as a period piece, I think the film has a lot of quirky charm about it. And of course the music remains wonderful, as fresh today as it was then. I may not watch this film frequently but I suspect I will not leave it forty five years before I watch it again.