POP UP CINEMA BRIGHTON

DIRECTOR: Richard Lester​

STARRING:  The Beatles & Wilfred Brambell

Join us for a special screening of the 1964 Beatles classic A Hard Day’s Night, followed by a Q&A with acclaimed journalist, broadcaster, and author Samira Ahmed, whose BFI Film Classics book explores the film’s enduring legacy and cultural impact.

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**PLEASE NOTE - Doors for this event open at 6.40pm in order that you can enjoy the beer garden prior to the screening. Please arrive before 7.30pm so that the Q&A can begin promptly. 

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ABOUT SAMIRA AHMED

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Samira Ahmed is the host of the BBC’s flagship arts programme Front Row on Radio 4, where she interviews leading film directors, actors, writers, and creators from across the cultural world. She also presents Newswatch on the BBC News Channel. In 2020, she was named Audio Presenter of the Year by the Broadcasting Press Guild.

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Alongside her broadcasting career, Ahmed has written for The Guardian and The Independent, and is now the author of the definitive British Film Institute's Classics volume on A Hard Day’s Night.

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A lifelong Beatles fan, Ahmed’s love for the film began in the late 1970s, watching her older brother's home-recorded Betamax copy until it wore out. Decades later, the film once again became a source of inspiration spurring her on during her landmark 2020 legal victory against the BBC in a high-profile sex discrimination equal pay case.

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In 2021, she interviewed Paul McCartney live on stage at London’s Royal Festival Hall. Then, in 2023, she made international headlines after uncovering the earliest complete recording of a Beatles concert in the UK, a 1963 performance at Stowe School, helping secure its acquisition by the British Library for the nation.

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​​Alongside the screening and Q&A, there will also be an opportunity to purchase copies of Samira’s fascinating book on the film and have them personally signed. Buy the General Admission + Book option at checkout to ensure your copy.

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ABOUT A HARD DAY’S NIGHT

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Before going on to direct multiple Musketeer and Superman movies, director Richard Lester created what would become not only a cornerstone of Beatles mythology, but also one of the most influential musical films ever made. Widely credited with helping invent the modern music video (for which he would receive the first MTV Vanguard award at the inaugural MTV Video Music Awards in 1984), A Hard Day’s Night remains a landmark of British cinema and pop culture.

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Named one of the 100 greatest films of all time by Time Magazine, the film received two Academy Award nominations, including Best Original Screenplay.

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From its exhilarating opening moments, with the Fab Four fleeing screaming fans through the streets of London, the film never lets up. John, Paul, George, and Ringo race from chaos to comedy as they attempt to make it to a live television performance, accompanied by Paul’s mischievous “very clean” grandfather, played by Wilfrid Brambell (Steptoe and Son).

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Shot in a vibrant faux-documentary style inspired by the French New Wave, the film follows the band over the course of 36 hectic hours spent dodging fans, journalists, authority figures, and the ever-present risk of losing Ringo.

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The Beatles’ wit, irreverent Liverpudlian humour, and extraordinary musical charisma are on full display throughout, as the film blazed a trail directly setting the template for everything from The Monkees television series to Spice World Spice Girls feature film. Filmed only weeks after the Beatles’ legendary appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, A Hard Day’s Night captures the group at the precise moment they transformed from pop sensation into global phenomenon.

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Featuring beloved early hits that would later appear on the album of the same name, A Hard Day’s Night remains one of the most exhilarating rock films ever made, a defining moment in the history of music, cinema, and British culture.

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Don’t miss this very special screening, Q&A, and signing event on June 25th.