The Beatles said the film was inspired by the Marx Brothers classic Duck Soup;[3] it was also directly satirical of the James Bond series of films.[4] At the time of the original release of Help!, its distributor, United Artists, also held the rights to the Bond series.
The humour of the film is strongly influenced by the abstract humour of The Goon Show, in which the director had personal and direct experience in the conversion of the radio format to television, and personal working experience with Peter Sellers in particular.[5] Beatles recording producer George Martin had also produced records for the Goon Show team. McCartney has always said that the Beatles style of humour was taken from the Goon Show. Many of the film's concepts are derived from Goon Shows, such as the presence of wild animals, music, fourth wall-breaking jokes and abstractions such as the closing statement that concludes the film.
