Robyn Maisner



Let it be

Being a child of two crazy fanatic Beatle’s fans, the famous motto in my house was “let it be”. Whenever my siblings and I would get into a fight, mainly over the remote control to the television, my mother would always say to me “Robyn, just let it be.”. Even though my parents were avid Beatles’ fans, I never actually discovered their music until I was ten, when my best friend Frankie introduced me to them. I’ll never forget the first time I heard the song, we were sitting outside on the courts for recess as she pulled out her walk-man (as they used to call them) along with a CD to go with it. The CD cover had four men on it, along with big bold letters saying, “The Beatles, get back and let it be”. It was in black and white so immediately I knew it was going to be some type of oldies music. As she put the headphones up to my ear the first thing I heard was “Whisper words of wisdom, let it be”. A light bulb went off in my head and I said “Hey! My mom uses that saying all the time”. That was the day, I, too, along with my parents and Frankie, became fascinated with the Beatles.

The Beatles, already being known as an “older” group to the music generation, soon began to fade. Their style of music and clothing were heading out fast. Through the 90’s, bands such as N’Sync and Backstreet Boys soon started replacing them. They all had the same type of idea as the Beatles; all boys in a band, stylish clothing, but they were just the more modernized version. The music world changed from hippie tunes (slow and soothing) to high-strung, perverted lyrics. There was violence being put in every song such as “lick me here, touch me there”. Through the years I would always listen to the Beatles once in a while, but never as much as I would in elementary school.

Junior year of high school approached. I was sixteen at the time when one day I was casually watching television in my living room. I saw an upcoming attraction for this movie called Across the Universe. The title itself got me going. It was in psychedelic colors with flashy lights going across the screen, so you could barely tell what was going on. As the commercial played I got more and more excited. I wasn’t paying attention so much to so much what I was looking at, but to what I was hearing. All the Beatles songs put into one movie, I thought to myself, “what can get better than this?”? There those words came into my head again:, “let it be”. Reopening this door of childhood memories of my older sister and I fighting over the remote for the TV started popping into my head. I could picture my mother standing in the background saying, “Girls! Let it be”. Her three most three favorite words said by the Beatles. I found it quite amusing that a director could turn a decade of songs and make it into a story line.

The symbolism created in the movie representing each song is incredible. It’s not necessarily that they change the wording and lyrics of the songs as they do change the melodies. One specific song is “It won’t be long”. They keep the meaning of this song by making it into Lucy (one of the main characters) missing her boyfriend who is at war. The intention of Paul McCartney writing this song was also for the purpose of missing his loved one. The director overall seemed to stay true to the Beatles by not adding any extra wording and letting the Beatles come through in this drama- filled movie. It sets a different mood to each scene making you not being able to peel your eyes off the screen.

From the beginning of Across the Universe, you learn that the characters’ names are all based off the Beatles songs. For starters, the title of the movie comes from a very popular song of their hit album “No One’s Gonna Change Our World” made in 1969. It is said to be written after John Lennon (singer and song writer) had a fight with his wife one night. Lennon said he had “an endless stream of thoughts” where the title comes from; “Across the Universe” (Across The Universe by The Beatles Songfacts). This title represents the Beatles by using the name of one of their songs to make it a new hit movie. It also has a lot of meaning behind it due to that the Beatles have made fame all across the universe. Starting in the UK to being one of the most well known bands in the United States, shows that their talent spread worldwide.

The main character, Jude, is based off their hit “Hey Jude”. Jude was from Liverpool, England (the same place the Beatles began their career) on the search for his father in America. Being a very attractive young actor, having the typical gorgeous brown hair and sexy British accent, he was appealing to all the young viewers watching this movie. He ends up meeting a family and falling madly in love with Lucy; the second main character, who plays the sister of Jude’s best friend Max. Lucy’s name is symbolic because it comes from the song “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds”. When the Beatles first wrote this song, the famous drug from that era, LSD, was their inspiration. They take Lucy’s character in the movie and portray her as a typical “hippie” from the 1960’s who therefore was on drugs, symbolizing the meaning of their song when first being written. The way they dressed Lucy and the way the Beatles dressed was almost identical. Their style was being shown through her character as they put her in headbands wrapped around her forehead along with bright flowery t-shirts and big baggy jeans to go along with it. When watching the movie I felt as if the songs came alive. When you first listen to the songs just on their album you can imagine what the characters look like (having knowledge of the style from the 60’s) and can really listen to the lyrics, but once you actually visualize them it changes your perception of everything. It’s like the whole album just jumped up and came to life.

The Beatles songs are all under the genre of “pop” or “rock” and essentially all have a certain symbolism towards them. Each scene created in Across the Universe whether or not one discovers it, is related to the Beatles and their life through the music industry. They take this genre of pop and switch it to fit a more modern audience. There is a specific scene where Jude is in a shipyard picking up his paycheck from an elderly man who states, “ I thought I would be doing something different at sixty four”. The symbolization in this scene is related to a song created named “When I’m sixty four” written by Paul McCartney at the age of sixteen. The way the director incorporates the Beatles’ meaning of the song when written into a scene where you can actually see an elderly man citing the lyrics made me actually understand it as well. The Beatles intended meaning for this specific song was switched when put into Across the Universe. The elderly man is depressed wishing he were doing something else at sixty-four, when the Beatles were talking about love and growing old together with their spouses.

Another example is Apple Records, the company in which founded the Beatles, is brought up when Jude is drawing a green apple and slices it in half to create two different images, making the records logo. Not only is this a marketing strategy for Apple records, advertising their music company, but also it is showing the original Beatles logo on their first CD made. Throughout the movie Jude is an aspiring artist, who creates all different images through watercolor paintings. The little innuendos are the most meaningful when it comes to this motion film.

The tempos of the songs were made to fit the mood of each character. By speeding it up or slowing it down, it would show what the scene was going to lead into. In the scene with Jude in his studio apartment, drawing Strawberries on his easel, they take the Beatles song “Strawberry Fields Forever” and fix it to fit his emotion. While Jude is thinking about his options, he starts singing, “ Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see, it’s getting hard to be someone, but it all works out.”. Jude is frustrated because it’s hard to become someone of importance in a time during the Vietnam War. He feels as if Lucy is overpowering him in her motivation to protest what is happening in the world, and he suddenly feels lost. The director paired these specific lyrics to this scene because it’s describing how it all ends up working out in the end and if you just simply let things flow, you will become something.

In Across the Universe, one of my favorite scenes in the movie is when their they’re all cosmic bowling and Jude is singing “I’ve just seen a face I can’t forget the time or place where we just met she’s just the girl for me and I want all the world to see we’ve met”. It’s amazing to actually hear Jim Sturgess (Jude) sing the lyrics of the Beatles through his own voice while telling a story at the same time. The bright colors and transitions through the scene really help bring out Jude’s mood. He’s describing the love he has for Lucy even though they just met.

You could tell each song was (you can say) “modernized” for the movie to get more viewers to watch it. The intended audience for this movie, being that it was rated PG-13, was for young adults and older. Being brought up in this generation, it was nice to see songs made from the 1960s, redone in a sort of way to fit our society. The way the Beatles made their music in the 60s was to appeal more to an older audience with soft paced music and guitar beats. Due to the new computerized music business, each song was then remade for the movie given a hip new beat to attract the generation of teenagers today. Feminism was occurring in the 1960s and 1970s along with the Vietnam War to go with it and that would be where the Beatles got most of their inspiration. Now that those issues are resolved and we have different problems such as terrorism going on, it made a difference in what artists are writing about today. People tend to think that every song feels the need to put a curse word or violence to make it interesting, but what I liked about Across the Universe was even though they changed each song, it wasn’t in a negative way. Being in the twenty first century with all this new technology, instead of making a tribute album to the Beatles or a “hits of the 60s” track they took an alternative route and decided to make a film. Young adults are much more interested now a days in seeing a good movie then listening to their favorite band on a CD. Releasing a greatest hit album on iTunes would not work for a generation who may have never heard of the Beatles, so instead they used this medium of creating a movie to present the songs in a different kind of way.

Along with the songs symbolizing different meanings throughout the movie, the plot of the movie also goes along with the artists in the band. They maintained the actual words of the lyrics in a similar way that they kept the accurate time period and setting. It takes place in the UK and the United States, both being places where the band members performed and were known.

The rooftop concert concluding the movie was related to the Beatles’ last performance. It took place atop their Apple Records office in the year of 1969. I found this it ironic that for that the director ended the movie using the same way the Beatles ended their last live performance. This movie I felt “re-created” the Beatles by livening up their music and bringing them back into the music industry.

Growing up listening to all the Beatles songs it was hard for me to fully grasp the meanings of each song made due to my age. They were singing to an audience of young adults and older and here I was at the age of ten listening as well. As my maturity level grew the meanings became clearer to me. I felt as if this movie Across the Universe made me see the songs in a completely different viewpoint. Although the Beatles faded through the years, this movie made me recognize and remember why I loved them so much. It brought back memories from when I was a child, and made me appreciate their lyrics more than I would of in elementary school. The little girl fighting about the remote control with her sister was now grown up carrying the motto of “ let it be” on with her to her new generation.

I am fascinated by the comparison here. You’ve done a good job analyzing the two items and showing where they intersect and diverge. I like your examples, particularly when you show me what you’re seeing, and would love to see more. I wonder about the personal thread in the essay, though. You begin and end with your connection to the Beatles through your family, but I would like to see more of how you were influenced by the Beatles in this movie. You touch on this at several points in the paper, but I think you could go further. For example, you say that you are “now grown up carrying the motto of “let it be” on with [you] to [your] new generation.” Show me why this movie reached you in a way the music alone did not. Be less general and more specific with your examples here (is it really just the new beats that brought the music alive to you?).

You’ve done good work on this paper, and you’ve chosen a very interesting comparison. The movie and the music and the group all seem to be larger than life, so show me larger than life! I would love to see more colors, hear the music, and experience the movie and the music through you. Don’t be afraid to paint these pictures, and give the reader a feel for both the music and the movie.

Works Cited

Across the Universe, Music From The Motion Picture. Interscope Records, 2007

"Across The Universe by The Beatles Songfacts." Song Meanings at Songfacts. Web. 26 July 2009. .

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