Not the Beatles

Rating: 7/10 (15 July 2019)

It's hard to classify Yesterday. It prominently uses Beatle's lyrics and song. It's funny but with a twinge of melancholy. And mostly it's a fantasy of what ifs. It's also predictable with a sad whimsical elemental surprise towards the end. For Beatle purists, this movie would be hard to accept and enjoy. Somehow the interplay between Beatle songs and the movie plot doesn't quite run smoothly and easily play out like Across the Universe (2007). Nor does Yesterday incorporate the creative movie magic that Across the Universe used with a compelling lavish way. This alternative reality fantasy appears to be a somewhat new take on the more oftentimes comedic or dramatized versions of reality such as John Candy's Delirious (1991) or Amazon's The Man in the High Castle series (2015) which make more of their own focused intensity in their delivery. This fusion of so many genres coming together in Yesterday ultimately changes the movie into more of an experimental film genre in progress. As a musical Yesterday doesn't sustain the intimacy of lengthy sweeping musical pieces as experienced in Rocketman (2019), La La Land (2016), Les Miserable, or Chicago (2002). Overall, the movie stands on its own, in its own way, but as a tribute to the Beatles, only the Beatles themselves can really authentically hit the original notes of emotional integrity with their own tributes