![]() They are wonderful magicians and entertainers and I adored seeing them in person in Las Vegas (they were better to their audience than I could ever expect-personally meeting and greeting EVERYONE after the show ended). It is well worth seeing-just not among the pairs very best stuff. Some of the highlights include actually hearing Teller talk (!!!) on film, seeing a LOT of squeamish tricks (such as passing snakes up the nose, the guy eating glass and many more) as well as the cultural information you learn (such as how they NEVER heat places in China during the winter). There are MANY things I liked about the show. In fact, it's just terrible and lacks the polish of their later (and much better) series, "Bull****". The song is hellishly bad and the cartoon isn't particularly good, either. HOWEVER, while the shows are pretty interesting, it is doubtful that many will get past the god-awful intro. They go to China, India and Egypt and it's all very interesting. The famous magicians travel to three cities around the world and they look at the culture and history of magic-especially the state of magic and magicians today. The 20 minutes of bonus features present less essential outtakes from interviews with some of the principals who give eyewitness accounts in the main documentary."Penn & Teller's Magic and Mystery Tour" is a short series produced for Canadian television. But at least there are plenty of still photos, some very brief vintage interview clips, some extracts of audio tapes from interviews Miranda Ward did with George Harrison and Ringo Starr while shooting took place, and some fairly entertaining storytelling from the more central participants. Note, too, that no actual Beatles music or clips from the film itself are seen or heard in the documentary (though the soundtrack has some facsimiles of Magical Mystery Tour songs). Since there aren't any major stories uncovered here, and since some of the memories by fans and miscellaneous people who happened to encounter the Beatles during the filming are kind of trivial, it's perhaps best appreciated by Beatlemaniacs rather than more general fans of the band. ![]() While Victor Spinetti would seem to make a good choice as the documentary's narrator as he acted in the film (and other Beatles movies), and he does offer the occasional anecdote, his links are actually a little overly campy, though not quite intrusively so. Among them are Paul McCartney's brother Mike McCartney, who contributed some ideas to the film (most crucially getting the Bonzo Dog Band to play in one sequence) Neil Innes of the Bonzo Dog Band itself press officer Tony Barrow Tony Bramwell, a personal assistant to the Beatles Spencer Davis, who visited the group on the set at one point Miranda Ward, a journalist who interviewed the Beatles during the filming Freda Kelly, the fan club president along for the ride, and even some of the dancers in the "Your Mother Should Know" section. In truth, Magical Mystery Tour (the movie, not the album) was one of the group's least successful and least interesting major projects, but at least a good number of people who did know the Beatles and were in their proximity during its making are interviewed for this 55-minute DVD. As the title implies, it emphasizes memories of those involved in some way in the filming, the talking heads pepped up by a bit of home movie footage taken of the Beatles and others on the sets. ![]() Though the actual onscreen presence of the Beatles in this documentary is light, it's a decent overview of their 1967 movie Magical Mystery Tour. ![]()
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