RICHARD LESTER – Movie Director

(U.S.A., 1932 – )

He moved to England in the 1950s and made his first experiences in independent television. His debut in cinema was a comic short film, The Running, jumping and Standing Still Film of 1960 in which his frenetic and vaguely surreal style was already well defined. In 1964, after other works, he made his first film with The Beatles, A Hard Day’s Night followed by Help! in the following year. The match between the exuberant vitality of the Beatles and the imaginative and quick paced style of Lester gave origin to two fortunate and lively cinematographic nonsense movies, whose verve Lester tried in vain to replicate in the numerous films that followed (from The Knack…and how to get it of 1965 to A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum of 1966, to Petulia of 1968, filmed in the United States and perhaps his best movie, to the The Three Musketeers of 1974). In 1973 Lester was called by the Young & Rubicam agency to film a series of spots for Barilla with Massimo Ranieri where, with great technical ability in mounting the sequences he was able to masterfully render the rhythm of the songs interpreted by Ranieri in the most beautiful squares of Central and Southern Italy.

Giancarlo Gonizzi

Bibliography

GIUSTI Marco, Il grande libro di Carosello (The Great Carosello Book). Milan, Sperling & Cupfer, 1995, p. 69