Across the Universe (2007)

Released amidst the recent onslaught of contemporary movie musicals, Across the Universe tells a tale of love, political unrest and war during the 1960s set to the music of The Beatles. As The Beatles’ popularity is still strong as ever and considering the success of movies such as Moulin Rouge!, that use a menagerie of contemporary tunes to fuel its story, Across the Universe undoubtedly seemed to be not only a safe bet but a good idea as well. Unfortunately, the film never manages to escape the realm of just a “good idea.”

If any group deserves to have their songs used in the form of a musical production, it’s The Beatles. Their career and discography are expansive to say the least. With all their sounds and styles, you could use their music in several different genres of musicals. It’s all a matter of how it’s executed. Writer-director Julie Taymor came up with a good idea but failed in the execution.

Song and dance numbers in musicals are meant to be fun and entertaining, which is mostly true for Across the Universe, but they are also supposed to help move the story along. That’s not the case here. Instead, the use of The Beatles’ songs is the main selling point, leaving the actual story and plot as an aside, calling upon it momentarily to help move us into the next rendition of a Beatles classic.

The plot itself is quite generic- a young man from England moves to America in the 1960s in the hopes of making something of himself. He falls in love with a girl and they get caught up in the turmoil of the times, encountering a variety of colorful characters along the way. Some call it a tried-and-true formula but it feels more tiredly formulaic than anything else. Case in point- the use of the Vietnam War as an antagonistic backdrop. Vietnam has been used so many times in so many films that it has almost lost its value as an antagonist. And the use of it as a shallow allusion to modern military struggles has only become tacky for me.

The characters are another of the film’s problems. All of them are flat, filling out one kind of gross generalization or archetype or another. Other characters are stand-ins for cultural icons like Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin. Very few, if any, characters have any depth, which makes them hard to appreciate or get behind. The actors all do a very good job of singing The Beatles’ tunes but that only gets you so far.

While I appreciate the use of several songs that are not among the most oft-heard Beatles tunes on the radio, I feel slightly robbed at the same time. Tunes like “Oh! Darling,” “Blue Jay Way,” and “I’ve Just Seen a Face” are inspired choices and help satisfy people like me, who enjoy The Beatles’ entire catalogue, but with the songs being the main focus of the film, why not go for broke and include all the classics? Where’s “Love Me Do,” “Help!” and “A Hard Day’s Night”? I’m sure they could have been slipped in there somewhere.

Perhaps to make up for some of the songs left out of the production, or perhaps just to be extra cheeky, many of the characters are named after people in Beatles songs. You’ve got Sadie, Jude, Lucy, JoJo, Maxwell, Desmond, Molly, Dr. Robert, Mr. Kite and even Prudence! But nowhere to be found is Eleanor Rigby, Father McKenzie, or Sgt. Pepper. At first it’s somewhat amusing but then the references just keep coming and it gets tired in a hurry.

The other issue I had with the film was with some of the ways the song lyrics were re-interpreted to fit the story. I didn’t have a problem with a teenage lesbian singing “I Want to Hold Your Hand” while watching the head cheerleader do her thing but when Uncle Sam starts singing “I Want You” in the draft office and soldiers carrying the Statue of Liberty through Vietnamese rice patties crying out “She’s so heavy!,” I can’t help but roll my eyes. The few times Taymor tries to use the songs to help the story we get groan-worthy literal segments like this.

All in all, Across the Universe is a good idea. It really is. But to make it work, you would need to relegate the Beatles songs to the role of a supporting player, something Taymor seems unwilling to do. Instead of crafting a love story and capturing the romance and drama of the 60s, all Across the Universe manages to be is a Beatles sing-a-long that doubles as an anti-war film.

RATING: 1.75 out of 5