I still remember when I first heard about this film, what it was about and who was behind it. The reason I remember it is simple, I thought we were in for a perfect movie by Danny Boyle, as he continues the trend of having one of the most varying filmographies out of any filmmakers. But when the first reviews came out, and everyone agreed that Yesterday was just “ok”, that made me less interested in the film. Well, finally I managed to catch it, and yeah; I can see why this film didn’t do as well as it should have.
Unfortunately, it has everything to do with that great premise. Imagine being the only one who remembers The Beatles? Whether you are their fan or not, you can’t deny the insane influence they had on pop culture, how many things and other groups exist because of them directly, and this movie feels like it never captures it adequately. There were some jokes in the film which worked, but the moment the story went onto Himesh Patel making it big due to their songs, the film started to lose me because we got into the nitty gritty of show business, and that’s not as interesting as the original premise.
The casting is excellent, Himesh had this sincerity to him that we rooted for him from the start, and then we cheered for him to do the right thing when the moment came. All his friends (including Sophia Di Martino, who is now known for Loki (2021 – ?, my review here), were great, and I wish we could have spent more time with them. But we need to discuss the mistreatment of Lily James.
I get that Yesterday wasn’t “her film”, so I am not arguing to make her character into a protagonist. But she was totally wasted in this film; her character was a blend of manic pixie dream girl mixed with “waiting awkwardly in British before the protagonist realises he loves me and I love him, and we should be together”. For someone with her talent, I almost felt bad for her, as she wasn’t given much to do here. And it bares to repeat; I understand she isn’t the main character. But even the supporting roles should have some agency and not exist purely to advance our main character, only to retreat and wait for the big finale.
Because this film was directed by Danny Boyle, it had a unique visual “flair” that made it not boring. There is always something happening; there are some surprises along the way. For example, the group of people, who follow Himesh around with the yellow submarine, that pay-off was different to what I expected. If only the entire film were like that, where it would surprise me more often whilst exploring the world without The Beatles. Don’t get me wrong, they do explore it for a moment, but then we spend more time on the morality of “is it stealing or not?” and “this is how showbusiness takes your soul” portion of the film and those sections didn’t fit as neatly as they should have.
This movie felt like Danny Boyle tried to make a Richard Curtis movie. It was a clash between this fantastically quirky rom-com and the brutality of what it takes to make it in modern-day show business. And I feel like that was Yesterday‘s biggest issue, as on the surface, these two films sound great on their own. I would love to see a quirky rom-com about this timeline where only one person remembers The Beatles. And I would like to see a darker, grounded drama about the unforgiving nature of show business, but this wasn’t it. They might seem like they would complement each other nicely, but in reality, you either want to spend time on one or the other.
Overall, Yesterday is a perfectly fine film that should have been anything but “perfectly fine”. It features one of the most classical and beloved Beatles songs, it has a great casting (albeit some characters were wasted), and the film makes one or two unexpected twists that work. But the film doesn’t know what it wants to focus on, and it ultimately feels disjointed. I would cautiously recommend this movie if you are a hardcore fan of The Beatles. For the rest, it’s honestly a flip coin kinda film, which I had a reasonably good time with, but it should have been much, much better.
That’s all for this one! Did you see it? What did you think about it? Let me know!
Until next time,
Luke