A Brief Rant in Defence of Yesterday

The Movie, that is, not the period of time.

December 19 2019

Have you seen the movie Yesterday?

I watched it on a long haul flight with fancy noise-cancelling headphones. I wasn’t expecting much, I mainly watched it because it was a movie about the Beatles (or at least their music), I had been told to watch it, I was too tired for a Ridley Scott or Christopher Nolan sci-fi, and the premise of it sounded actually potentially brilliant.

Turns out I actually loved it (disclaimer: I did also love Love Actually).

And so when I got home, I made my parents watch it, and they both loved it, along with my sister who was jet lagged and had already seen it twice, but still managed to watch most of it with us.

Obviously, not every loved it.

People say it misses the human aspect of the Beatles phenomenon.

Some people say it ignores the complexity of the cultural context in which transformative music (and art) emerges.

Some people have said the John scene at the end was weird.

Nope, sorry (well, maybe the John scene was weird, but it still almost made me cry both times).

The movie is its premise: the fantastic scenario of the Beatles music disappearing from the earth, some lucky pleb getting to be the one to reintroduce it, and the joy of watching it unfold. And that’s what it does — excellently, with bonus Ed Sheeran— stereotypes, cliches, plot holes be damned.

I loved it.

But I did also love Love Actually, which again was a movie simply about its premise: that love, actually, is all around us.

Can’t you just let us have these nice things, please.