Yellow Submarine

Once upon a time... or maybe twice, there was an unearthly paradise called Pepperland – a place where happiness and music reigned supreme. But all that was threatened when the terrible Blue Meanies declared war and sent in their army led by a menacing Flying Glove to destroy all that was good. Enter John, Paul, George and Ringo to save the day! Armed with little more than their humour, songs, and of course, their yellow submarine, the Fab Four tackle the rough seas ahead in an effort to bring down the evil forces of bluedom.

When their spectacular feature, Yellow Submarine, debuted in 1968, it was instantly recognisable as a landmark film. By merging the visual splendour of animation with a fantasy – adventure tale filled with peace, love, hope and of course, music, Yellow Submarine captured the essence of the Sixties. And by integrating the freestyle approach of the era with innovative animation techniques, it revolutionised a genre.

“The music, let’s face it, was the inspiration for the whole film,” said Yellow Submarine line producer John Coates. Directed by George Dunning, and written by Lee Minoff, Al Brodax, Jack Medelsohn and Erich Segal, Yellow Submarine began its voyage to the screen when Brodax, who had previously produced nearly 40 episodes of ABC’s animated Beatles TV series, approached Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein, with a unique vision for a full-length animated feature.

Inspired by the generations’s new trends in art, Yellow Submarine sits aloingside the dazzling Pop Art styles of Andy Warhol, Martin Sharp, Alan Aldridge and Peter Blake.

After seeing just four of German poster artist Heinz Edelmann’s incredible drawings, they knew he was the right man for the job.

“I thought from the very beginning that the film should be a series of interconnected shorts” remembers Edelmann. “The style should vary every five minutes or so to keep the interest going until the end”. These styles included melding love-action photography with animation, 3 dimensional sequences and kaleidoscopic “rotoscoping” where film is traced frame by frame into drawings.

The entire process took nearly two years, some 14 different scripts, 40 animators and 140 technical artists, but achieved its aims in producing a ground breaking piece of animation.

This visual feast is combined with a brilliant soundtrack of Beatles’ music including “Eleanor Rigby”, “When I’m 64”, “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds” and “All You Need Is Love” creating a masterpiece that can be enjoyed by all.