Across the Universe - Movie set to Beetles songs

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Pesty

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I'm not sure if this movie got much of a wide reception. But last weekend, I saw this movie with a couple friends, and it positively blew my mind. I wasn't around in the Beetles era, but my dad used to play beetles music a lot when I was a kid, but being the rebelious kid, I rejected it as "old guy" music.

Wow was I wrong.

The storyline of the movie tells the history of that era, through the eyes of Jude, a guy from liverpool who jumps ship into America, and his girlfriend, who becomes an anti-war protester. The visuals are just amazing, and the renditions of the Beetle's songs are amazing. I know it may be heresy, but Joe Crocker singing Come together, and Martin Luther McCoy's rendition of While My Guitar Gently Weeps, (played on a double bound sunburst tele of course) are both in my mind better than the originals. I bought the soundtrack the next day, and I've been listening to it continually since.

If you even remotely like the beetles, find a way to see this movie, it's amazing.



[webmaster edit] Fixed your YouTube link -- you need to only put the video id in between the YouTube tags NOT the entire URL as had done.[/edit]
 

Wayne Alexander

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I too love that movie. If you need a refresher about how great the Beatles' songs are, this does it - some of them are re-cast pretty substantially (I Want to Hold Your Hand is a wistful ballad, for instance, and that just emphasizes how wonderful the lyrics, music, chord changes, etc. are in that "simple" song). The visuals are amazing, and even though in some ways it's just a collection of music video type numbers, they're great ones and linked by a simple but serviceable boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets her back story. And the more you know about the Beatles' lyrics and mythology, the more fun the movie is. (One character named Prudence always comes into the shared Greenwich Village apartment through the bathroom window, for instance).
 

Bonneville Bruce

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I've heard some of the songs and vids on youtube and I liked them a lot. That is the beauty of good music, it can be done well in many ways, and will have a longer life because of it.

Bonneville Bruce
 

Pesty

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I guess that made it even more obvious. I think I should fix it, but it's kinda funny leaving it that way. I was only born in 88, long past the era of the Beatles.

I'll get it right from now on.

I'm currently listening to I am the Walrus from the soundtrack. I won't spoil who sings it... but I totally had a "No... way" moment when he came on screen.
 

SixStringSlinger

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Oh man, I saw it too, a few weeks ago, and it was AMAZING. I wasn't even thought of, much less around, in the Beatles' days, but I love what I've heard (I've heard quite a bit, just pointing out I'm no Beatles expert). I saw it with a friend and we both loved it, both how the songs we knew and recognized were reworked (so well!) as well as the songs that left us looking at each other like, "You ever hear that one?"

Just for the record, I'm 20 and the friend I watched it with is 19, and I also have a bunch of friends my age who watched it and loved it, so it's hardly a flashback, nostalgia thing. Just a really good storyline supported by some great songs.
 

howlin

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Hey, thanks for the heads up!

We don't get stuff like this in Europe till months later in some cases but as I'm heading to the States maybe there will be time to see it. Hope so . . .
 

Stuco

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I've been wanting to see that since I saw a preview about a year ago (I think). Is it still in theatres?
 

SixStringSlinger

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I've been wanting to see that since I saw a preview about a year ago (I think). Is it still in theatres?

Possibly, though it has been out for a while now. I saw it at the end of October, and it had already been out a while by then. If you have an IMAX near you, check it out. I wouldn't doubt they gave "Across the Universe" the IMAX treatment. And I wouldn't really know, but it's always possible tehy keep movies around a bit longer than regular theaters.
 
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