Review of 'Yesterday'

Well, my wife and I just saw Yesterday, having taped it last week on HBO, and we loved it. This is contrary to some otherwise worthy critics, but what else is new.

The premise, that some kind of solar flash causes just about everyone in the world to have no memory of the Beatles, except a struggling young songwriter, Jack Malik, who remembers the Beatles and all of their songs, was a nice, even brilliant, piece of science fantasy. It's a setup Mark Twain would've been proud of, not to mention all kinds of more recent science fiction and fantasy writers.

And the song delivery was excellent -- Himesh Patel, who played Jack, has a fine voice. Yesterday would've been enjoyable, just because of all of those wonderful Beatles songs, even if the plot was bad or rickety. As it was, the plot was good enough, with everything from true love to commerciality and its drawbacks as Jack becomes world famous -- as a writer of fabulous (Beatles) songs -- given a solid workout.

And there were some points of sheer, heart-breaking incandescence. As I a science fiction writer, I've explored John Lennon not being killed more than once -- see my Loose Ends Saga - but Yesterday explored it in a unique way. They got an actor to look just as Lennon might in his 70s, and even if his voice and accent weren't perfect, just his face was enough to nearly stop your heart.

Back to the plot, there were some good jokes on jokes woven into the story, such as the oft-commented upon pressure by Ed Sheeran (who plays himself) on Jack to the change the title of "his" song to "Hey, Dude". And the dream sequences were handled very well, including the oddities of Jack's dreams, as when Paul and Ringo show up in Jack's nightmare as the true writers of the Beatles songs.

So, hats off to Danny Boyle and Richard Curtis for creating this movie, to Himesh Patel and Lily James and Ed Sheeran for memorable performances, and to the Beatles for such peerless music. I predict that Yesterday will become a much-loved classic.