The plot follows The Beatles' John Lennon, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney and George Harrison in animated form while they help Old Fred get Pepperland back from the Blue Meanies.
We get movie exclusive characters like the antagonists Blue Meanies and sidekick nobody Jeremy Hillary Boob PhD. We get to see wonderful psychedelic visuals that feel like that one scene from 2001: A Space Odyssey and the surreal paintings of Salvador Dali. Its beauty lies in the visual medium, not necessarily in the animation itself. There are plenty of scenes that obviously are stills or repeats of previous scenes but reversed. These can be excused cause of budget and other reasons but still.
The film uses a strange artstyle that feels out of character but also in character. It's whacky, silly, absurd and sometimes grotesque. Without this artstyle the movie wouldn't have felt right with all the psychedelic fish and seas the Fab Four visit.
The movie makes a lot of use of the Beatles' musical talent (a no brainer) by having already released and new songs written specifically for this film. Sometimes though, the movie feels like a big animated music video for some of their hits. the plot gets lost in these moments.
Now that I think about it...this film is in the same category as "Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure". You have the loose plot of characters going on an adventure saving something/someone. On the way they visit varying locations that don't connect to eachother and sing songs.
Sure, I would say it's a pretty great film. The ending with the actual Beatles breaking the 4th wall and the credits with translations of "All Together Now" was a good calming way to end an insane hodgepodge of colors and music.
Anyway the next spot the Yellow Submarine will visit is an Octopus Garden.
Yellow Submarine on IMDB
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