Charming and lovely - although about as predictable as a film can be.

Rating: 7/10 (19 April 2020)

Yesterday tells the story of Jack, a struggling musician who wakes from an accident in a world without The Beatles (and a few other notable absences). The story is very straightforward - with this exclusive knowledge Jack rises to fame, pulling number one hit after number one hit out of nowhere. I thought what the film did interestingly was changing how certain elements of The Beatles catalogue and image were perceived in this alternate world. It made me think about why and how certain ideas, songs, images, outfits etc become popular, which was relatively fun.
Aside from this the film was fairly derivative - fame isn't all that its cracked up to be, there's more to life than money, love is the real prize etc etc. You could spot the ending from a mile off, although it still retained its charm. One of my major criticisms of this movie however is that I wanted more Beatles songs! There weren't as many as I was expecting, although I suppose it was a shortish movie so they wanted to give more emphasis on story than singing a song from start to finish.
I wasn't overly enamoured with Himesh Patel's performance. Jack just seemed constantly uneasy and insecure. Whether I should pin this criticism on Himesh or Boyle I don't know, either way the character didn't hit the spot for me. Lily James was as expected - quirky, charming, and excellent. I really do love her as an actress and am yet to see her put a foot wrong. The inclusion of Ed Sheeran was... odd although not unappealing. I thought it would drag me out of the film a bit, but he did a solid acting job and it was actually integrated into the story pretty well, it wasn't a gratuitous cameo as I feared it would be.
Yesterday is a fun way to spend two hours. Its not too serious, straightforward, and has a funny and interesting concept which it executes perfectly well. I'm glad I watched it, but once is enough for me.