Rhino Factoids: Head Hits the Big Screen

47 years ago today, The Monkees released their first and only major motion picture, an effort which-although it has certainly found a fanbase over the years—served to befuddle far more of the band's fans than it charmed.

1968 did not begin as the best of all possible years for The Monkees: NBC had kicked their prime-time TV series to the curb in March, which—probably not coincidentally—was the same month that they released their final top-10 single, “Valleri.” By the time the show disappeared from NBC's lineup, however, Micky Dolenz, Davy Jones, Michael Nesmith, and Peter Tork were already knee-deep in production on Head, which was most decidedly keeping them busy.

Written by Jack Nicholson and Bob Rafelson, with the latter helming the picture, Head was, to borrow a phrase from the trailer, “the most extraordinary adventure, western, comedy, love story, mystery, drama, musical, documentary satire ever made…and that's putting it mildly,” and if that wasn't enough to leave potential theater patrons at a complete loss as far as what to expect, the ante was further upped by a poster campaign which featured precisely no photos of the Monkees.

By the time Head had its grand premiere in New York City on November 6, 1968, it's arguable that could've released a film that rivaled A Hard Day's Night in critical acclaim and still not found redemption on the pop charts, but Head was the antithesis of a light, fun, and freewheeling comedy. Not only was it not a commercial success, but it found the Monkees so far removed from the tone of their TV show that it may well have resulted in the band losing fans. Not that they didn't come back into the fold over the course of time, but one can only imagine how traumatizing Head must have been for those poor folks who strolled into the theater in search of a amusing cinematic romp and instead found a psychedelic stream-of-consciousness satire.

Needless to say, the Monkees themselves weren't exactly happy with the film's reception, either:

“Most of our fans couldn't get in because there was an age restriction, and the intelligentsia wouldn't go to see it anyway because they hated the Monkees.” - Micky Dolenz “We were pawns in something we helped create but had no control over. We should have made Ghostbusters, OK?" - Davy Jones “We thought that this was the beginning of our film career, and that this was really going to be a tremendous hit movie. Boy, did we get that one wrong.” - Michael Nesmith "The movie dropped like a ball of dark star. The simile of a rock in the water is too mild for how badly that movie did." - Peter Tork

As noted, Head has been reassessed over the years, and looking at the film in retrospect, it's actually a rather amazing piece of work no matter what you think of it as a motion picture, if only because of how far removed from people's expectations it proved to be.