Wonderfully Horrible Netflix Instant Films: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

I continue wading through the mire of crap that makes up Netflix Instant and picked up a movie that's very close to my heart. Have you ever had a movie that you truly loved to hate? Something you loathed so much that the very act of despising it brought you pleasure? For me that movie is Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. "But how bad can a musical featuring the music of The Beatles' last four albums possibly be?" If that musical stars Peter Frampton and The Bee Gees, pretty friggin' bad. The movie was made in 1978, a dark time when Frampton and The Bee Gees were some of the biggest acts in music. The filmmakers probably thought that they had a brilliant idea in casting these douchey singers into a musical that's a painfully literal interpretation of Beatles' songs. They were wrong. Very wrong. My friends and I discovered this gem in high school and there was a time in which we forced people to watch it at parties. Maybe that's why we were unpopular...

So, the movie stars Peter Frampton as Bill Shears, leader of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Bee Gees). He's in love with a girl named Strawberry Fields. You get how this works? They are seduced away from a town called Heartland, America with the promise of fame and fortune by an evil record exec. They move to LA and become corrupt. Then the bad guy reveals his plan to  steal the band's magic instruments (?) and build a "Future Villain Band", which is played by Aerosmith. Frampton and the gang have to get back their instruments from Dr. Maxwell Edison (Steve Martin), The Sun King (Alice Cooper), and some guy playing Mean Mr. Mustard. Of course, all of this doesn't matter. It's all a thin attempt at a plot prop up a series of cameos held barely together with Beatles songs. Mind you, the only spoken dialogue comes from the narrator, Mr. Kite (George Burns). The ENTIRE REST of the movie are Beatles songs sung by s%#ty artists. Imagine Peter Frampton singing The Long and Winding Road, The Bee Gees falsettoing A Day in the Life, and Alice Cooper biting the head off of Because. Pretty awful thought, huh? So, why do I highly reccomend this to you? Because it is the king of "so bad it's good" films. My suggestion is to drink a lot before and invite a bunch of friends over that appreciate quality crap.