"Yellow Submarine" re-released on DVD and Blu-Ray

[Ccook50]

The Beatles' 1968 animated movie Yellow Submarine was re-released to home video this past Tuesday, on both DVD and Blu-Ray. The group's corporate entity, Apple, acquired it from MGM/United Artists and had it restored without the use of software technology. It had a special engagement nationally to selected theaters on May 10.

Thanks to today's DVD players, many of which now can upscale the appearance of movies to 1080p, it looks terrific for a 44-year-old film. The restoration is outstanding. (Also of note is that Robert Zemeckis' now-aborted remake of the movie would have been out around this time.) It's loaded with extras, including interviews with voice talents, as well as Erich Segal (who says he wrote the movie's screenplay--Jack Mendelsohn wrote it and Segal was brought in to tweak it), pencil drawings, storyboards, the original theatrical trailer--in fact, outside of the goodies they added (specially made cels, decals, etc.) it's virtually identical to the 1999 DVD release.

Problem? Kinda. Being the same as the 1999 release, it has the "Hey Bulldog" segment which wasn't in the original release. In the original after the Beatles free Sgt. Pepper's band from the big blue ball, they do the first verse of "Baby, You're A Rich Man" followed by a thirty-second repel of the Meanies' counterattck, leading to Ringo reunited with the Boob. This was in the very first home video release (VHS, 10/20/87). The 1999 edition only does the opening instrumental from "Baby, You're A Rich Man" followed by the Beatles and Sgt. Pepper's band discussing the situation followed by the "Hey Bulldog" segment (the two bands flummoxing the Meanies' multi-headed dog).

This edition could have gone one of two ways. Either release the original edition with the "Hey Bulldog" segment as an added feature, or the 1999 release with the original aforementioned segment. An important aspect is that Yellow Submarine, regardless of which version is out, is being reintroduced to a new generation. A customer I waited on at work has a three-year-old son who was wearing a T-shirt of the Saturday morning cartoon Beatles and she told me he loves Submarine. The song itself was written for children, and that the movie's staying power is equal to that of the song can't be wrong.

[Howard]

I am going to look for this DVD - ain't seen YS in ages.