Footage from a video of the Beatles' only tour of Japan in 1966 has surfaced after a lengthy court battle in the country.
The film, without sound and in black and white, lasts 35 minutes and is currently in free access on YouTube. It was done back then by the Japanese police for security issues.
In the footage, the four musicians can be seen beaming off the plane , dressed in kimonos, and then performing in front of a riotous crowd at the Nippon Budokan hall in Tokyo.
These files have, however, a curious detail: apart from the faces of the Beatles, the faces of the other people filmed are blurred , for reasons of respect for private life.
For years, the issue of image rights for these recorded people was a sticking point between Japanese Beatles fans and right-to-know advocates and local police.
Fans turned to the Supreme Court of Japan to try to authorize an uncensored version, claiming that it was a "historical document" and considering it absurd to want to blur the faces recorded more than 50 years ago, almost impossible to identify today, according to they.
But the court rejected these arguments in 2018 and the police's proposal to make the document public with the faces blurred was finally prevailed.
