Yesterday (Dir Danny Boyle, 1h 56m)

What do you get when Danny Boyle, a director known for speculative fiction films heavy on emotion meets Richard Curtis, the writer behind most of the best British rom-coms of the last 30 years? A charming, but narratively predictable film in which a washed up singer songwriter suddenly finds he is the only man on the planet who remembers the Beatles, and his subsequent rise to, and battles with, fame, whilst trying to win back his manager/childhood sweetheart, deal with his new found popularity, and "write" new songs, all whilst working to remind the world of the music of the Beatles.

Undoubtedly, the charm of this film comes from its protagonist, Jack-even once the film has set itself on Curtisine autopilot, it is him that holds it above the mire. Played by Himesh Patel, most well known as an allumi of British television soap EastEnders, Jack at first is a failing musician, playing to drunken pub audiences, half empty tents at music festivals, and, despite the actions of his friend, childhood sweetheart, and childhood sweetheart Ellie (Lily James), seems determined to pack in his time as a musician. When a sudden power failure worldwide, and an accident during this, lands Jack in hospital, he soon discovers that he is the only person who remembers the Beatles, and eventually begins to capitalise on this.

This, to be honest, is the best part of the film as a whole, with Boyle neatly ramping up the tension-in his hands alone, this could have been, as his previous work shows, a far tenser, and less charming film, with Jack convinced he is either insane, or part of some huge hoax-this tension does return at the height of Jack's fame, and a beautifully tense cover of Help! together with a surprisingly stark sense that Jack is part of the fame machine, a product to be sold, that, in a way, despite finding fame, he has lost his freedom along the way. This is in no small part due to Patel's acting, as he goes from shy young man still living with his parents, to increasingly cocky rockstar, to someone desperate to escape his fame, and simply have a normal life, not to mention Patel's ability as a musician that shines through in multiple sequences.

There is also his undoubted chemistry with Ellie, whose relationship with him is tested on several occasions, as he has to choose increasingly between fame and her, between normality, and the gift that has been thrust upon him. James, for her part, is the film's other key asset, even if the film's finale rather does undermine much of the character that the first two acts built up-there is, throughout, a sense that it would not matter whether Jack was famous or successful, because of the bond between them-there are two excellently wrought sequences that show that, even from the beginning, before the mysterious disappearance of the Beatles, she enjoyed his music, and saw him as talented

Unfortunately, it is with this decision between Ellie and fame that the familiar Richard Curtis plot-by-numbers starts to appear, and roll over the rest of the film like a inexorable rom-com glacier, from idiotic side-man Rocky, to Ed Sheeran (it is he) playing himself as a (surprisingly) likable pastiche of himself as a charming if rather blokey sidekick-cum-friend, to a scenery chewing record industry type played by Kate McKinnon, who, in blunt shortness, is there to be the Big Bad for Jack to defeat, together with an almost Gillamish boardroom scene in which Jack is unveilled to the record industry, whilst the rest of the cast mill about in that typically Curtis style, being overly boozy and parochially warm to each other.

The Richard Curtis Rollercoaster takes us up, down and through the familiar plotlines, from Jack stalked by two fans (one Russian, one Liverpudlian) who somehow also remember the Beatles, who turn out to be more than happy he's ripping off the Fab Four as long as their music exists, to a fumbled tryst between Jack and Ellie, to just how charming everything British is, and just how terrible and shallow and materialistic everything American is. Yet this is a film that, the closer it actually gets to the Fab Four, the less sure it seems.

The songs themselves enjoy a suitably decent array of cover-versions, though at points the single electric/acoustic guitar or piano does rather show the limitations of trying to do complex songs, or stick too close to the original songs-the film never really gets into the Beatles' more avant-garde songs, or the lesser known numbers-but with an eyewatering £10 million attached to the rights of getting these tracks, the film has to make the most of them, including in Daniel Pemberton's score. Divorced from the film, they're certainly competent stand-alone covers, if unexciting and oddly generic sounding.

The problem is, bluntly, Yesterday doesn't really know what to do with the Beatles in a world without the Beatles-enough column inches have been dedicated to the colossal plotholes that allow, for example, a largely unchanged history of music without one of its key tenants, for Ed Sheeran to exist in a world that, for example, never really felt the need for the loop pedal, or Radiohead to exist without the invaluable innovations the Beatles made in using the studio as an instrument and piece of equipment.

Moreover, however, in the film's last third, the appearance of one of the Beatles themselves-Ringo and Paul appear, at least from knee-down, in a overly marketed and in the trailer dream-sequence that spoils the surprise-is a strangely saccharine sequence that feels both unnecessary and bizarrely exploitative, delivering a message that is so generic that it could have been gleaned from any Beatles song, rather than direct from source. Sadly, for all this film's charm-and to be fair, it has charm in spades, it's charm, and the music of one of the most influential bands in rock, put to work in keeping a plodding generic script ticking through the motions

In a market that sees ever increasing back catalogues dragged through from Broadway to Hollywood, from the runaway success of Mama Mia! to, ironically, Across the Universe, a messy adaption of the Beatles back catalogue, Yesterday at least manages to feel like a film in which the Beatles' music feels integral, rather than shoehorned in to fit overly elaborate, self-referential plots. Sadly, Yesterday, with its generic plot, and over-reliance on Curtis's tried and tested formula, is half the film it ought to be, a pale homage to a band more complex than a simple rom-com plot can muster.

Rating: Neutral