YELLOW SUBMARINE

UK, 1968, 85 minutes, Colour.
Voices: John Clive, Geoffrey Hughes, Peter Batten, Paul Angelus, Dick Emery, Lance Percival.
Directed by George Dunning.

Yellow Submarine is an animated feature primarily for adults, and it takes the form of a moving audio-visual modern poem. 1968 heard 'Love is Blue'. This is out of date for 1969 because a 'world without love is blue'.

The Blue Meanies, a hideous species who hate music, invade Pepperland (a happy Edwardian world) with an antimusic missile attack and succeed in practically petrifying the populace. The Monstrous Chief Blue meanie cannot even bear the word 'Yes'. Old Fred escapes alone in the Yellow Submarine to find help - and reaches Liverpool where he fathers four mod-knights who adventure seas, monsters, holes, backwards and forwards in time itself till they liberate Pepperland with Love, Yes, O.K. and 'All You Need is Love'.

Maybe the poem means that the Beatles with their music and personal campaigns have given some love and affirmation to liberate our world. Verbal and visual puns in the Lennon style abound. Art and music styles flash by almost too quickly to register. Some Beatle songs are given a visual treatment, the most memorable being the lonely people images, in telephone boxes, two hostile soccer teams, for Eleanor Rigby - and a satiric playful 'Nowhere Man'. The psychedelic panorama of 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' gives images that must correspond to a hallucinogenic trip. The press sheet described the adventure as a 'modyssey'. This is right. An intriguing experience.

1. The quality of this film, its reputation? The reputation of the Beatles and their contribution to the success of the film? The quality of the animation?

2. The importance of the mystique of the Beatles: as a group and their impact in England, throughout the world? Their impact as individuals and their personalities, the way these were illustrated in the film? The legend of the 60s, the heroes and saviours as transferred into this story? The importance of their music and its quality, the songs and the lyrics? Their themes of joy and love? Their appearance at the end and the invitation for all to join in song and joy?

3. The presentation of the Beatles' songs, their popularity, the varying styles in which they were visualized artistically and with animation? The variety of style? 'Yellow Submarine', 'When I'm Sixty-four’,’ Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds', 'The Nowhere man', 'Eleanor Rigby', 'All You Need is Love', 'Northern Song, 'All too Much', 'Sergeant Pepper', 'All Together Now'. The varying styles, the verbal humour and puns, genuine wit? The capacity for communication, the basic messages of these songs?

4. The importance of the animation: a fantasy world, its relationship to the real world? The styles e.g. for 'Eleanor Rigby', the presentation of Pepper land, the drawing of the Beatles themselves? The various seas they crossed? The villains with the Blue Meanies and their henchmen? The use of colour, the predominance of blue for evil?

5. What kind of a world was Pepperland? Ordinary people there, old Fred, the band, music and joy? The contrast with the Blue Meanies and the way that they were drawn, their henchmen, the apple guns? The importance of evil and the freezing of joy? The contrast between joy and the ogres, between love and hate? The affirmation of saying Yes and the Blue Meanies forbidding of this? A symbol of evil and human beings needing to be saved?

6. The Lord Mayor and his commission to old Fred, the personality of old Fred? The significance of the mission and the quest? People in need seeking saviours?

7. The status of the Beatles as saviours for this kind of joyful world? The world of Liverpool and 1Eleanor Rigby'? Old Fred and his searching for the saviours?

8. The presentation of the Modyssey: the details of the various stages, the Sea of Time, the Sea of Science, the Sea of Monsters, the Sea of Green. the Sea of Holes? The songs and their relationship to the journey and the quest?

9. The contribution of the Nowhere Man, his personality and song, his leading the Beatles in their quest?

10. The build-up to the battle its humorous side, the Blue Meanies and their horror, their retreat, joylessness being vanquished?

11. The renewal by love music and joy bringing people alive, un-freezing them, the symbolism and the significance of love?

12. How was the film a representation of the mood of the 60s? Pessimism and the prevailing optimism of the Beatles? Signs of hope and joy?