Hey folks, Harry here with a report on a print I've been most eager to hear about. The Restored SuperDuper Ultra-Spectacular YELLOW SUBMARINE!!! This is, quite frankly, one of my all time favorite movies and the restoration and integration of long talked about, but never seen, scenes has thrilled and teased me for quite some time now. But what I am most curious about is the 'Theatrical Release' date and schedule. Though I searched for hours today I could not find a release date anywhere... Though I do know a DVD is coming up soon.... God I hope they are planning a wide release for this one... At least to a 100 or so markets. I hope....
Hi there, Harry! Call me Athos. Like so many other film geeks in the world, I love the site. Keep up the great work.
And I know where of you speak on The Sword & The Sorcerer, it's a great guilty pleasure. My personal favorite B movie is a trashy little flick called Galaxy Of Terror. Cheesy dialogue, bizarre special effects, and Erin Moran's head explodes! What more could you want? But enough careless banter....
I was lucky enough to catch a press screening of the restored and extended version of Yellow Submarine up here in Rain City. I wasn't sure if anyone would want to know, but I thought I'd send the good word along. And the word is very good indeed.
I don't know how old I was when I first heard the Beatles, but it was Yellow Submarine that made me aware of them. One of my favorite toys as a kid was a Yellow Submarine model kit, the first model I ever put together. Once I learned there was a film about it, I had to see it. I remember the night CBS first broadcast the film on TV, sitting there with my Mom entranced by what I saw. Up until then, like most kids, I didn't know there was any animation beyond Walt Disney and Saturday morning cartoons. Yellow Submarine with it's Peter Max meets Andy Warhol artwork, surreal sequences, nightmarish villains, & incredible music, was a shock to my system. It left me with a passion for animation, especially the experimental kind, and a deep sadness over Disney's domination of American animation. As I grew older, I continued to revisit the film, seeing more each time. In college, when I ran a campus film group, I showed a double bill of Yellow Submarine & Fritz The Cat. The print was faded, scratchy, speckled, yet still magical.
Well today, my eyes were opened anew, as I finally saw the film on the big screen. The restored print of the film is nothing short of amazing. It puts to shame the video & laserdisc release of several years ago. The images are sharp & the colors vibrant, bringing to life the pop art fantasy world of the film.The sound is a marvel as well, capturing every nuance of the musice and every wonderful/awful pun in the dialogue. The sound is so clear, that I caught several lines that I'd never heard before, not in a lifetime of viewings.
Which brings us to the restored sequences...
To be fair, anyone who wants to be suprised by the restored scene should skip this part, since it will contain some spoilers.
A gentle pause as people leave their seats to avoid the spoilers....
The major sequence restored to the film is the long-heard-of, but rarely-seen "Hey Bulldog" musical number. It happens near the end of the movie, just after the Beatles set Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band free. The Beatles meet and talk with their counterparts, who resemble slightly younger versions of themselves. Pursued by Blue Meanies leading a four-headed bulldog, the Beatles and their doubles hide inside a stand-up player piano. The keys play the intro to "Hey Bulldog", which starts the number.Vanishing in and out of the piano, our heroes confound their pursuers and make their escape. But this isn't the only change to the film. Several small scene transitions appear to have been restored, along with some dialogue. Even people like myself, who've seen the film more times then they can count, will see new things in this version.
Ok everybody, you can all come back now,
Yellow Subamine is going into theater release on September 1st here, so you can probably catch up with it about the same time at an art theater near you. If you love the Beatles or Sixties Art or experimental animation, you owe it to yourself to catch this film.
And don't forget: "It's all in the mind".
