Beatles film Let It Be will be relaunched exclusively on Disney+ more than 50 years after its premiere, the streaming service has announced.
The documentary, originally released amid the band’s break-up, will be added to the platform in May.
Filmmaker Peter Jackson said the film is the “climax” to his 2021 docuseries The Beatles: Get Back, which was compiled from nearly 60 hours of unseen footage shot in January 1969.
See The Beatles in the 1970 film, Let it Be, fully restored for the first time, streaming May 8 only on #DisneyPlus. pic.twitter.com/tI6MGWCN6d
— Disney+ (@DisneyPlus) April 16, 2024
The 62-year-old’s Park Road Post Production team has restored Let It Be from its 16mm negative and has remastered the sound with the same technology used for the Get Back series.
The famous foursome – John Lennon, Sir Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Sir Ringo Starr – acted as executive producers on the film, which was directed by Sir Michael Lindsay-Hogg.
The documentary features an appearance by US funk musician Billy Preston, who joins the band as they write and record their album Let It Be.
Jackson said: “I’m absolutely thrilled that Michael’s movie Let It Be has been restored and is finally being re-released after being unavailable for decades.
“I was so lucky to have access to Michael’s outtakes for Get Back, and I’ve always thought that Let It Be is needed to complete the Get Back story.
“Over three parts, we showed Michael and The Beatles filming a groundbreaking new documentary, and Let It Be is that documentary – the movie they released in 1970.
“I now think of it all as one epic story, finally completed after five decades.
“The two projects support and enhance each other: Let It Be is the climax of Get Back, while Get Back provides a vital missing context for Let It Be.
“Michael Lindsay-Hogg was unfailingly helpful and gracious while I made Get Back, and it’s only right that his original movie has the last word… looking and sounding far better than it did in 1970.”
Sir Michael said: “One month before its release, The Beatles officially broke up. And so the people went to see Let It Be with sadness in their hearts, thinking, ‘I’ll never see The Beatles together again. I will never have that joy again’, and it very much darkened the perception of the film.
“But in fact, there’s a great deal of joy and happiness and creation going on, and Let It Be is – especially when you get to the roof, and you see the exchange and the way that they look at each other – essentially a happy and ‘up’ movie.
“I was knocked out by what Peter was able to do with Get Back, using all the footage I’d shot 50 years previously.”
The Lord Of The Rings filmmaker’s 2021 documentary used audio restoration technology that allowed vocals, music and conversations among the band to be isolated, enabling a new mix of the Revolver album, sourced directly from the four-track master tapes, in 2022
After this, Jackson and his sound team, led by Emile de la Rey, used software to help separate Lennon’s vocals from the piano in song Now And Then, which was released last year.
Let It Be will debut exclusively on Disney+ on May 8.