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Director Julie Taymor's trippy, psychedelic, lush tribute to the music of The Beatles can be suitably branded as ambitious and audacious. Across the Universe seeks to tell a fictional love story set amid the tumultuous years of the 1960s, and utilises countless Beatles songs in its storytelling - naming characters, planting allusions, and drawing plot inspiration from the Fab Four's musical oeuvre. All told, almost three dozen Beatles songs feature on the soundtrack. Taymor was responsible for the Broadway retelling of The Lion King, thus the songs employed therein are largely reconceptualised to suit the medium of film. Visually, Across the Universe is a marvel - it's exquisite, clever, creative and enthralling. It additionally contains traces of romance and war, accompanied by issues of the 1960s (i.e. the Vietnam War, drugs, protests, and so on). But Across the Universe fails to include two constituents utterly crucial for a motion picture: a solid story and narrative focus. It's a prolonged, asinine dream - and it doesn't make a lick of sense!
All the protagonists are named after Beatles songs while also alluding to Sixties' icons. There's Jude (Sturgess) from Hey Jude, Lucy (Wood) from Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, Max (Anderson) from Maxwell's Silver Hammer, Prudence (Carpio) from Dear Prudence, JoJo (Luther) from Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, and Sadie (Fuchs) from Sexy Sadie. Logically, much of these character names exist to allow a musical set-piece to be performed about them.
As Sadie belts out Helter Skelter and Don't Let Me Down, she unmistakably resembles Janis Joplin. Likewise, with JoJo's soulful electric guitar playing during While My Guitar Gently Weeps, he's an obvious allusion to Jimi Hendrix. Screenwriters Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais continue to add additional layers of 60's references and imagery. Eventually, Across the Universe itself begins to undertake the pop-culture vitality of an Andy Warhol feature or Roy Lichtenstein painting.
In a nutshell: the film's plot follows Jude who travels to America in search of his real father. After a rather anticlimactic meeting, Jude meets soon-to-be college dropout Max. Together, Max and Jude head to New York. Jude begins to fall in love with Max's sister Lucy, and Max finds himself drafted in the army. As Max fights a battle in Vietnam, Jude and Lucy fight their own battle as anti-war protests are conducted.
Across the Universe appears to owe a hefty debt to Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge! in addition to Beatles films like Help!, A Hard Day's Night, Magical Mystery Tour, Yellow Submarine and Let It Be. Director Taymor brought music producer and composer Elliot Goldenthal onto the project. Goldenthal decided not to remain faithful to the original songs, but instead to reinterpret them for the new generation (a generation which wasn't alive during the 60s). These reinterpretations frequently add another dimension and a new underlying meaning. I Want to Hold Your Hand, for instance, is sung by a young female high school student as she watches a cheerleader she has a secret same-sex crush on. Due to these changes, this song becomes a sensuous confessional rather than conveying the peppy teen angst of the original version. A lot of the songs were apparently sung live (not lip-synched), and they therefore seem far more natural. On the other hand - to paraphrase The Wanderers -"Don't fuck with the songs". It may be a laudably ambitious concept, but this doesn't necessarily mean it's a good idea.
The recreation of classic Beatles tunes is sometimes great. Joe Cocker singing Come Together, Eddie Izzard singing For the Benefit of Mr. Kite, and Bono singing I Am the Walrus are absolutely wonderful sequences. Yet, in all honesty, what is the point? Across the Universe is a succession of flashy, spectacular music videos connected by pulp. It seems the screenwriters decided which songs to use before conceiving a rubbish plot to join them. More than half the songs do nothing to advance the plot. The lyrics appear to have no meaning. What was the point of Jude singing Revolution, really? Scenes like these reek of self-indulgence. The filmmakers decidedly opted to include as many legendary Beatles songs as possible, plot be damned. The fusion of a few realistic concepts (like the Vietnam War and the rallies against it) with highly fantastical musical set-pieces is jarring, to say the least. At times the characters are also ensnared in unfortunate situations. How are these overcome? Some singing and colourful imagery. The worst offender is when abandoned by a bus. Max explains he might not be able to attend his appointment with Uncle Sam. After some singing, life is normal again and they're all home.
The characters are two-dimensional and clichéd. Zero character development transpires. It's gruelling to connect with the characters on a truly human level. Emotional investment is virtually impossible, giving a viewer no reason to care about a trouble to be overcome by the characters. The actors do place forth charismatic performances, though. Jim Sturgess is particularly watchable, although his singing voice is underwhelming. As with all the actors, Sturgess does his best with the flawed material. In supporting roles, there's a solid selection: Evan Rachel Wood, Joe Anderson, T.V. Carpio, Martin Luther and Dana Fuchs. Bono (who sang a few cover versions of Beatles songs, most notably Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds heard during the end credits) steals the show in his stylish I Am the Walrus musical sequence, Eddie Izzard is spectacular in the overlong musical set-piece of For the Benefit of Mr. Kite, and Joe Cocker deserves kudos for his singing of Come Together.
Perhaps Across the Universe is better regarded as an experience rather than a movie. The story itself is incidental; a threadbare excuse for Taymor to string together reconceptualised covers of her favourite Beatles songs. It's inhabited by a handful of insipid characters that are genuinely superfluous in the grand scheme of things. These irrelevant characters are given their own musical set-pieces just because Taymor et al were unable to find a way to tie all the greatest Beatles songs into Jude and Lucy's tumultuous romance. Across the Universe is a definitive case of style overstepping substance. However, the film is overflowing with imagination and bolstered by a dazzling visual style. When a film is this stylish, it's certainly difficult to brand it a total failure. It's a visually arresting film, but its stimulating use of bright colours and imagery is the only positive to unearth. After enduring 130 minutes of a single-noted string of music videos, though, it grows fairly tedious.
Across the Universe is a beautiful misfire - beautiful, yes, but still a disappointing misfire. While it's a daring experiment - unique, aesthetically alluring and distinctive - the script is unsatisfactory no matter where you turn. It tells a hopelessly clichéd love story, the narrative is unfocused and the characters are trite. Perhaps Across the Universe is simply an acquired taste. Perhaps it should just be looked upon as a succession of enthralling music videos. Perhaps it should be perceived as merely a valentine to the artistic and idealistic spirit of the 60s as symbolised by the music of The Beatles. Draw your own conclusions, as films like these are gruelling to critically analyse and opinions will be radically diverse.
All you need is love!
Love is all you need!"
6.2/10
