Despite its obvious modest budget, this keenly analytical and wide-ranging bio-pic, written by Michael Thomas, Stephen Ward and director Iain Softley, ostensibly about The Beatles' pre-fame gigging days in Hamburg, circa 1960, could easily be subtitled The Stuart Sutcliffe Story. A talented painter but a mediocre musician, it is by virtue of his life-long association with John Lennon and his brief stint as a bass player with the soon-to-be legendary group that Sutcliffe will always be remembered as the so-called fifth Beatle. It was during the boys' Hamburg sojourn that Sutcliffe announced his intention to leave the band to pursue both his studies and burgeoning romance with a young photographer named Astrid Kirchherr. Though a hurt and, some would say, jealous Lennon characterised his close friend's resignation (and infatuation with Kirchherr) as an unforgiveable betrayal of their long friendship, fate provided a substantially more tragic coda. Reinforced by an evocative soundtrack, a palpable sense of place and time and a solid performance from Lennon-lookalike Ian Hart (who first played the famous Beatle in The Hours and Times in 1991), Backbeat adds a largely forgotten but fascinating addendum to the well-documented history of a cultural phenomenon.
