Across the Universe

This topic contains:

• overall comments and recommendations
• details about Across the Universe's classification and consumer advice lines
• a review of Across the Universe completed by Young Media Australia (YMA) on 5 November 2007.

Overall comments and recommendations

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) and the associated consumer advice lines.

YMA review

This review of the movie Across the Universe contains the following information:

• a synopsis of the story
• themes
• use of violence
• material that may scare children
• product placement
• sexual references
• nudity and sexual activity
• use of substances
• coarse language
• the movie's message

A synopsis of the story

Across the Universe is a lively musical set in the 60’s. It interweaves the songs written by the Beatles with the story of Jude (Jim Sturgess) who travels across the Atlantic from Liverpool to the USA to find the father he has never known. Jude is befriended by a college dropout, Max (Joe Anderson), who introduces Jude to his sister Lucy (Evan Rachel Wood). Jude and Max move to an apartment in New York together.

After Lucy’s boyfriend is killed in Vietnam she joins Max in New York and she and Jude fall in love. Jude tries to make a living as a graphic artist while Lucy is studying at university. The plot turns serious when Max is called up to fight in the Vietnam War. Lucy joins the Vietnam moratorium marches but gets caught up in a radical anti-war movement that goes further than she had expected. Her political activity separates her from Jude who is arrested in a riot and sent back to Liverpool.

Unable to resume his life in Liverpool and forget Lucy, Jude returns to America to see if he can rekindle their relationship.

Themes

Children and adolescents may react adversely at different ages to themes of crime, suicide, drug and alcohol dependence, death, serious illness, family breakdown, death or separation from a parent, animal distress or cruelty to animals, children as victims, natural disasters and racism. Occasionally reviews may also signal themes that some parents may simply wish to know about.

War, political protest, drug use

Use of violence

Research shows that children are at risk of learning that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution when violence is glamourised, performed by an attractive hero, successful, has few real life consequences, is set in a comic context and / or is mostly perpetrated by male characters with female victims, or by one race against another.

Repeated exposure to violent content can reinforce the message that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution. Repeated exposure also increases the risks that children will become desensitised to the use of violence in real life or develop an exaggerated view about the prevalence and likelihood of violence in their own world.

There is some violence in this movie including:

• rough play on a baseball field
• Max and his friends drive golf balls through dormitory windows while drunk
• Max goes sliding down the bowling alley and collides with the pins
• Several riot scenes are shown with police brutality – police viciously beating protestors
• A young boy is shot and kicked
• Buildings are set on fire
• A girl is shown with a bruised face after being beaten by her boyfriend (beating not shown)
• War scenes are shown where soldiers are shooting and being shot at
• Jude punches a man, which results in a general fight
• Lucy is grabbed and handled roughly by police during a riot
• Jude is beaten by police during a riot and is shown with a bloodied face

Material that may scare children

Under eight

Children under eight are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations, the death of a parent or child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters. Children aged eight to thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic threats and dangers, violence or threat of violence and / or stories in which children are hurt or threatened.

In addition to the above-mentioned violent scenes, there are some scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children under the age of eight, including the following:

• surreal and psychedelic imagery of bodies that appear dead floating in the water
• underwater scenes of nude people floating and swimming
• war scenes and riots
• the young boy who is shot and killed is shown dead in a coffin with people at his funeral grieving
• Max is shown lying in bed a hospital ward with a bandage around his head. Several other wounded men are in beds near him.

Over the age of thirteen

Children over the age of thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic physical harm or threats, molestation or sexual assault and / or threats from aliens or the occult.

Some children in this age group could also be disturbed by the violence and the anti-authoritarian culture in this movie.

Product placement

None of concern

Sexual references

• There are some sexual references in this movie, including:
• Jude’s father tells him he remembers having some ‘good times’ in Liverpool during the war (WWII) - referring to the fact that he’d fathered Jude.
• Looking at one of Lucy’s friends, Max asks “When did Emily get tits?”
• A female character, Prudence (T.V. Carpio), is gay
• When Max’s friends are devising ways of him to avoid the draft, they advise him to pretend he’s a homosexual, say that he’s raped little children and put track marks on his arm to pretend he’s a junkie.
  mention of masturbating alligators
• Some of the musical lyrics are provocative (eg in ‘I am the Walrus’)

Nudity and sexual activity

There is some nudity and sexual activity in this movie, including:

• provocative dancing in skimpy clothing
• Jude and Lucy kiss passionately and are seen in bed together
• Sadie (Dana Fuchs) and JoJo (Martin Luther) kiss passionately
• women are shown nude in the underwater scene
• Jude draws Lucy in the nude and they discuss whether he has got her nipple right in the drawing

Use of substances

There is some use of substances in this movie, including:

• smoking of tobacco and marijuana
• use of hallucinogenic drugs with no apparent adverse effects
• frequent drinking of alcohol

Coarse language

There is some coarse language in this movie, including:

• Bastard
• Shit
• Crap
• Oh my God
• Screw
• Piss
• Bitch
• Arse
• Fuck

The movie's message

Across the Universe is a colourful, highly original musical that captures the essence of the late 1960’s. The imagery is very powerful and surreal at times, capturing both the peace-loving, free-thinking spirit of the time and the turbulence of anti-war riots and the terrible realities of war.

This movie could give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children attitudes and behaviours, and their real-life consequences, such as:

• casual sex
• taking drugs
• war
• political protest