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‘Tommy,’ ‘The Wall’ & Beyond: A Look at 55-Plus Years of Films Based on Albums
A look at movies based on albums in Billboard's back pages: Tommy, The Wall, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Alice's Restaurant.
“Arlo Guthrie is about to become The Thing to talk and write about,” trumpeted an ad in the Aug. 23, 1968, Billboard for the just-released Alice’s Restaurant movie based on his 1967 album of the same name. One praised it as a “gripping fantasmagoria,” while another panned it as a “travesty of worn-out symbolism and general tackiness.” The same issue also reported on “the record war between the original rock opera and the movie soundtrack,” which were on MCA and Polydor, respectively. “The $10 million movie adaptation of Pink Floyd’s international double-album bestseller was demolished” at a London premiere, reported the Aug. 7, 1982, issue.
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