A Hard Day's Night | |
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![]() UK theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Richard Lester |
Screenplay by | Alun Owen |
Produced by | Walter Shenson |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Gilbert Taylor |
Edited by | John Jympson |
Music by | Musical Director: George Martin Songs: Lennon–McCartney George Harrison[a] |
Production companies |
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Distributed by | United Artists |
Release dates |
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Running time | 87 minutes |
Countries | United Kingdom United States[1] |
Language | English |
Budget | £189,000[2] (~US$529,000) |
Box office | $11 million[2] |
A Hard Day's Night is a 1964 musical comedy film starring the English rock band the Beatles – John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr – during the height of Beatlemania. Directed by Richard Lester, it was written by Alun Owen and originally released by United Artists.[3] The film portrays 36 hours in the lives of the group as they prepare for a television performance.
The film was a financial and critical success and was nominated for two Academy Awards, including Best Original Screenplay. Forty years after its release, Time magazine rated it as one of the 100 all-time great films.[4] In 1997, British critic Leslie Halliwell described it as a "comic fantasia with music; an enormous commercial success with the director trying every cinematic gag in the book" and awarded it a full four stars.[5] The film is credited as being one of the most influential of all musical films, inspiring the Monkees' television show and pop music videos, and various other low-budget musical film vehicles starring British pop groups, such as the Gerry and the Pacemakers film Ferry Cross the Mersey (1965).
In 1999, the British Film Institute ranked it the 88th-greatest British film of the 20th century.[6]
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