Man on the Run

Imagine that the little band you put together in your teens exceeded every possible dream of success, worldwide fame, rave reviews, unprecedented adoration from fans, buckets of awards, and money money money. Then, it all ends, the band breaks up, the complications from business managers and lawyers and hard feelings create intense misery. And you’re only 27 years old.

That is what happened to Sir Paul McCartney as the 1960s were ending. This film, produced by Sir Paul, tells the story of what he did next.

The first thing he did next was a combination of unwinding and despair. Sir Paul, his wife Linda and her daughter from her first marriage moved to a remote farm that seemed like it was at the end of the world. He tells us he thought he would never write another note.

The peace of the farm is healing. He likes the sheep. He becomes a vegetarian. Linda has a baby. And then he returns to music with the McCartney album, the one with, in my opinion, one of the greatest love songs of all time, “Maybe I’m Amazed,” and then Ram with “Too Many People,” what today we’d call a diss track about John Lennon (not discussed in the film).

He wants to go. back to his roots, start a new group. Linda agrees to join. “Well, that’s two, then,” Paul says. His plan is to play at small venues and have the kind of band the Beatles was in the days of the Cavern Club and Hamburg, where, in his mind, everyone was equal. Much has been written about whether the Beatles was equal with two people writing most of the songs and making most of the decisions, but whether it was or not, four teenagers performing in their home town of Liverpool is not the same thing as an international superstar assembling (hiring) a new band.

It is a lot of fun at first, traveling around and playing for small groups who are more surprised and curious than appreciative. Like a Supreme Court justice arguing your ticket in traffic court or George Takei showing up to act in your fanfic “Star Trek” movie. This is what Sir Paul loves, playing music with his mates for an audience who isn’t drowning out the music with screams.

Documentarian Morgan Neville has assembled archival clips, including some endearing home movies, in an impressionistic, occasionally whimsical, mosaic. Sir Paul, who produced, is famously cheerful (compare his Christmas song to Lennon’s, and recall that he wrote “You have to admit it’s getting better” and Lennon added “Can’t get no worse”). His oddly cool reaction the day Lennon was murdered is included, though sympathetically portrayed as a response to an unforgivably rude question. In this film he allows himself to get more introspective than usual, talking about how he and John were estranged but never stopped loving each other and about how Linda and his children helped bring him back to music. When Wings breaks up, he knows he can start again. And if he never reaches the heights of the Beatles era, that’s fine. As a fan of Sir Paul for decades, who’s seen him in concert twice, I found this a pleasure.

Parents should know this film includes some strong language and social drinking.

Family discussion: What would you do if everything you had worked for suddenly stopped? What is your favorite Paul McCartney song?

If you like this, try: “A Hard Days Night” and “Get Back”