The Fab Four – or their lawyers at EMI Japan to be precise – are letting Vietnamese director Tran Anh Hung use the original recording in his latest film Norwegian Wood. Anh Hung, who was nominated for an Oscar aged 31 for The Scent of the Green Papaya, has adapted cult Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood. The filmmakers were originally planning to use a cover version, but when Anh Hung was editing, he realised that only the original would do. Fortissimo Films, which is selling the film internationally, says it’s extremely rare for an original Beatles recording to be approved for use in feature films. But I can think of plenty of examples — from The Curious Case of Benjamin Button to Ghost Town and Withnail and I. And of course, Robert Zemeckis is remaking Yellow Submarine 3D for Disney.







ohmigawd i can’t wait for this. hopefully it will be a smash and someone like christopher nolan notices and directs a murakami adaptation, kafka on the shore would be amazing on film.
I think Hard Boiled Wonderland would make for a GREAT film. Very excited about this one.
For Murakami fans, this is fantastic news. We’ve always worried that our favorite novels would get butchered during an adaptation, but with Anh Hung Tran’s directing, Mark Li’s cinematography, Jonny Greenwood’s score and the inclusion of the original “Norwegian Wood,” our hopes are as high as ever.
Does anyone know if Greenwood is moving into full time composing, or if these films were just passion projects?
Don’t recall an original Beatles tune in Curious Case of Benjamin Button (but great stuff from Preservation Hall, Bix Beiderbecke, Sidney Bechet and Armstrong).
Looking forward to this movie. Not surprised EMI would grant permission for a pic like this.
“Twist & Shout”, during the love montage where Pitt and Blanchett renovate their apartment together.
cult?
The stills I’ve seen from this look amazing.
I would love to see more Murakami adaptations, but Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The End of the World would be nearly impossible to film.
As a big fan of Sputnik Sweetheart, which would be an unforgettable cinematic experience, I hope Murakami’s books gets a boast from this new film. Can’t wait!!!!
Isn’t Zemeckis’ Yellow Submarine cancelled, or at least on hold? I’d be pretty happy if it was still in production but I was under the impression that it wasn’t.
The Beatles are the owner?
Withnail & I got the Beatles songs because George Harrison produced it. I was actually talking about this with a friend recently. Other than Benjamin Button and Ghost Town, which were rare exceptions, I could only find about a dozen films listed online that have ever been able to use original Beatles recordings, instead of covers.(That’s excluding Beatles films like Help).
The Beatles always were big in Japan.
Anybody know what it costs to get an original Beatles song?