Part concert, part documentary, this film follows the band’s preparations in the re-staging of their acclaimed collaboration, So It Goes, with the artist Liam Gillick and the 12-piece synthesizer orchestra that spectacularly captured the headlines during Manchester International Festival 2017. The complexities extend beyond the technical and logistical: this is a band that rarely looks backward, yet for this project, they had to reflect on – and deconstruct – the band’s history, in order to create something very new. Written by SHOWTIME

Director Ron Howard tracks the fan phenomena that was Beatlemania from its zenith – 1963 to 1966 – to its end when the Fab Four withdrew from live performance. Landmarks from their US breakthrough in 1964 with I Want to Hold Your Hand to the controversy prompted by John Lennon’s flippant “more popular than Jesus” remark are chronicled in a documentary that includes among its interviewees Paul McCartney, Elvis Costello and Eddie Izzard.