What really pissed me off in this film though is the way the narrative clumsily forces characters to undertake actions or have beliefs that will allow them to sing a certain song and have it make a slight bit of sense. The first real stinker of an example of this is when Prudence is at a cheerleading session in high school and because the film requires her to sing “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” (for whatever reason) the narrative makes her a lesbian so that the line “You’ll let me be your man” is perfectly acceptable. My absolute favourite example though is the literal representation of the song “I Want You/ She’s So Heavy”. In order for the narrative to fit this song as literally as possible, the character of Maxwell is conscripted to join the U.S. Army. However, his complex personality and deep character background make him not want to go to war because dying is a bad thing! It is at this point that a giant Uncle Sam poster comes to life and sings “I Want You” to him. I am not making this up, I swear. As the song goes on, we see him being examined as he is prepared to join the army. As the song reaches the “She’s So Heavy” section, we see all of Max’s platoon singing this as they carry the Statue of Liberty on their backs. Gone are the days when the audience can understand metaphors, double-meanings or analogies because we apparantly can’t cope unless we can visually see a literal representation of what is being sung.