Across the Universe

Across the Universe *1/2

Directed by Julie Taymor
Written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais

Starring:
Evan Rachel Wood as Lucy
Jim Sturgess as Jude
Joe Anderson as Max Carrigan
Dana Fuchs as Sadie
Martin Luther as JoJo
T.V. Carpio as Prudence
Spencer Liff as Daniel
Bono as Dr. Robert
Eddie Izzard as Mr. Kite

131 Minutes(Rated PG-13 for some drug content, nudity, sexuality, violence and language. )
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Last year it was "The Black Dahlia" and this year it's "Across the Universe." Two projects that appeared to be labors of love at the start, and then turn into awful awful messes. And its funny that they end up coming out the same weekend, just one year apart.

"Across the Universe" is director Julie Taymor's love letter to The Beatles, but the film is such a mess and such a complete travesty to the songs of the Beatles, that while watching it you get the same feeling you get while reading a chain letter-mild amusement at how stupid someone could be, and then you discard from your brains and hands completely. This is one of those films that has such an intriguing concept, and if done right it could end up being a masterpiece. But instead it was choppy and cheesy and cannot find the right tone, and has so many extra things thrown it for the hell of it that even though the film doesn't feel long, just because it has more useless scenes that ones that are needed, it could use a trip to the editing room.

"Across the Universe" begins during the Vietnam War, where we meet Jude (ha. . . ha. . . ha) who has come to America to see his father for the first time. There he meets Max who introduces him to life and the two become fast friends. Jude soon meets Max's sister. Lucy (ha. . . .ha. . . .ha) and of course, Jude and Lucy fall instantly in love. When Max escapes New York, the two of them end up getting an apartment with Sadie, a singer, and soon the place is hoarded with other people-including JoJo a guitar player, and Prudence (ha. . . ha. . . .ha) when ran away from being in love with another woman. Lucy soon comes to visit them with a note that Max has to meet at the draft office. Max goes into the horrors of war, and in between love songs with Jude, Lucy ends up protesting with the others, trying to start a revolution and bring her brother home. But Jude isn't exactly the man with the megaphone, as he puts it, and spends most of his time drawing. Plus he's not supposed to be in the country anyway, so he doesn't really care about getting drafted.

It's a very loose plot, and it really only exists for Taymor to throw in various Beatles songs. You know most musicals end up playing a song because it has to do with what is going on at that moment in the story. Not this film. Things just kind of shot at you, including a rather painful fifteen minutes where first it was Bono singer "I Am the Walrus," and then it was Eddie Izzard singing "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite." The Mr. Kite scene was actually pretty nifty out of the context of the film, and as something you could spot on YouTube or another internet provider it's a neat little video. But in the movie, where it really has no business being in the context on what is going on, it doesn't work at all. Side characters exist for little reason other than to revolve certain songs around them. I'll talk about the Prudence character, who pops up at the very start to sing "I Want to Hold Your Hand," which ends up becoming a cheerleaders ballad to another cheerleader. She then finds her way into the halfway house with Jude and the others, and gets depressed, so of course they have to sing "Dear Prudence." And then he vanishes from the rest of the movie without a trace. There is also a painfully long amount of time given to Sadie and JoJo, who end up having a bit of a love affair going on, but there is no real side story to that and it just pops up to sing certain songs like "Oh! Darling!"

Aside from the names, there are several other "sly" Beatles references, all of which just made me grimace in horror. One of them was trying to be cute, when Prudence ends up coming into the house she sneaks in, and when Sadie asks where she came from, Jude's answer (of course) is "She came in through the bathroom window." At least they didn't sing the song, but just the remark was enough. Let's talk about the main characters now-Jude and Lucy. Their love story doesn't allow you to even care about them in any shape or form, because we're supposed to accept the fact that they fall in love during the course of songs like "I've Just Seen a Face," and "Because." Singing a song isn't development, and if I want to care about the characters I'm watching, I just need some kind of dialogue. As for the acting, Jim Sturgess who plays Jude, actually has quite a nice singing voice, but Evan Rachael Wood seems to be getting the idea that this is the role that will shoot her to the top. Whenever she starts to sing she contorts her face into this diva pose, and her acting just gets over the top at times. She should stick to the roles that she's been quite great in, like "Thirteen" and even the currently in release "King of California."

As for Taymor's message, certain songs end up having the duel meanings, which is a good idea, but it just got muddled in mixed ideas and motifs. It felt like Taymor put on the screen every single idea that she had. During the cover of "I Want You" there is a segment where the soldiers are carrying a giant Statue of Liberty during the lyric "She's So Heavy." During "Strawberry Fields" the strawberry's end up being tiny bombs and grenades. So it's an anti-war message, right? And then soon the people that Lucy ends up getting involved with end up being just as bad as the soldiers. So it's a pro-war message, right? No. The moral of the story is. . . obviously. . . all you need is love. You get it. Another Beatles song. So we've come full circle. At this point I was dumbstruck by this film. What an awful homage it ended up being.

There are a few things that I say this film was good for. One of them are certain visual scenes. I already mentioned the Mr. Kite segment. But at times the editing and the visuals just seemed like something that was done on someones computer, for a film that was being released straight to video, and not like a feature film that could have been an event instead of me feeling like I was sitting in the basement of an ex-hippie. I liked the starting point of the eventual "Across the Universe" song, which was kind of beautiful in a way, until Taymor decided to do a cross between that and "Helter Skelter," which ended up being painful for the ears, and taking away all poignancy that the scene started with. Other than that, this is quite the dud-an film that I'd give the award for the Most Ruined Beatles Songs in The Shortest Amount of Time. This film exists for no reason that to cram in the most bad covers, and somewhere amongst the rubble that is "Across the Universe" there is an idea. An idea for something that could have been good under the right circumstances, but this movie is that an elaboration on that great idea. It's a mess. A complete mess. An good idea does not make for a good film.

Now Playing At:
Regal Cinemas Union Square
AMC Lincoln Square 13 and IMAX
AMC Empire 25