From the first time I saw a preview for Across the Universe, I expected a lot. I love the Beatles’ music, and I kind of liked Moulin Rouge, and I saw this movie as essentially being a “mashup” of the two. How could it go wrong: Beatles songs (yes!) set to sweet-looking choreography numbers (ok!) in a movie about the 㣠s. But even from that first glimpse, I had my doubts. I told myself that it would be great, but I had this nagging suspicion that there was no way the film could live up to these expectations.
And so, after a somewhat long wait for it to come out, and an annoying extra delay because movies never seem to come to my town, I finally went to take a look. I went with my girlfriend, another Beatles lover, who had seen the movie a week before me and had not stopped raving about it. Another good sign, of course, but that voice in the back of my head reminded me that she had the same things to say about Ever After and Rent.
It began auspiciously enough, with an a capella rendition of “Girl” by the unintroduced Jim Sturgess, followed by a Janis Joplin-esque “Helter Skelter.” The first real scene introduces the first of the choreographed numbers, with two contrasting versions of “Hold Me Tight”: an American high school prom, and the dusky Cavern Club in Liverpool.
And here begins the endless torrent of Beatles in-jokes. Within the first half hour or so, we already get to know Jude (hey!), Lucy (not yet airborne, and sans diamonds), Max (including a later reference to his silver hammer), and Daniel (a trickier one – Rocky Raccoon’s rival). Later additions to the cast of characters include JoJo (made his home in Detroit, not Tucson), Sadie (sexy), Prudence (who additionally comes in through the bathroom window), and Doctor Robert (played by, yes, Bono). A few notables missing include Sergeant Pepper and Lady Madonna, but I suppose that means there’s room for the sequel.
All kidding aside, this onslaught of characters seems pretty arbitrary. As the movie progresses, we learn very little about most of these characters. Many seem to be thrown into the mix just to give Beatles fans a little nudge and a wink. The focus remains on the budding romance between Jude and Lucy, but numerous side plots seem to multiply like rabbits: creative differences between bandmates JoJo and Sadie, Max getting drafted (read: left out of much of the movie’s middle), and Prudence seemingly falling for all the wrong guys.
All the while, this maelstrom of namedrops whirls through a disjointed plot of a film. Sure, we get a nice exposition about some of the main characters heading to New York, and we get varying degrees of background details for a few. But, like the decade the movie represents, some drugs get thrown in and everything kind of falls apart. As expected, these youths discover the wonders of all matters of psychedelic drugs, making for some great visuals but some horrible storytelling.
Expanding on the visuals: As expected, the movie contained several musical numbers enhanced with visual effects. However, most of these took place during the cast’s drug-addled trip across the country (which they undertake for some reason, I don’t really remember), and do little to advance the plot. Not to detract from the visual beauty of the scenes; indeed, these scenes look great, from the psychedelic “I Am the Walrus” to the cut-out-like “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!” One other example which actually does advance the plot is “I Want You/She’s So Heavy.” Appropriately enough, this number accompanies Max’s trip to the draft office (Uncle Sam does, after all, “want you”).
Along with (or sometimes instead of) the visuals are choreographed dance numbers. For the most part, they look pretty good too, albeit not quite on the scale I was expecting. But no complaints here.
This brings me to the music itself. Of course, all were originally performed by the Fab Four, providing a pretty steep basis for comparison. But I’m pretty open to reinterpretations of these tunes: I was a moderate fan of the all-covers Beatles soundtrack to I Am Sam, and I fell in love with the album accompanying the Cirque du Soleil stage show. These versions, however, don’t really measure up. Most are either simple a capella sing-talk numbers (“Girl,” “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”) or renditions by Sadie’s Joplin-meets-Hendrix band (“Helter Skelter,” “Oh! Darling”). This is not disparaging the merits of either type (especially the latter, which are often quite good), nor is it complaining about the voices of the principal cast (especially Jim Sturgess’s Jude and Evan Rachel Wood’s Lucy). But the similar-sounding songs get grating after a while.
The rule, however, has exceptions. The gospel-tinged rendition of “Let It Be” (which is, notably, my favorite Beatles song in the first place) fit very well. Max and Jude’s rollicking “With a Little Help from My Friends” is pretty ordinary (hello, Joe Cocker), but the fun scene makes up for it. But Martin Luther’s (JoJo’s) instrumental version of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” does the best of capturing the spirit of the original, in a Hendrix-infused blues number. Good stuff.
Overall, the film was a little cloying to my Beatles sweet tooth. I felt like the continuous stream of references was there to make people forget that there really was no coherent plot. The music, while it shows its high points, rarely rises above a mediocre rendition of a Beatles classic.
A love story set against the backdrop of the 1960s amid the turbulent years of anti-war protest, mind exploration and rock 'n roll, the film moves fro...More at HotMovieSale.com
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