Across The Universe(2007)

This is my first official film review on this blog so bear with me. Across The Universe(2007) is a film directed by Julie Taymor who in the past has directed the films Frida(2003) and Titus(1999) and has a Broadway background. She takes her inspiration from Broadway and directs a musical that incorporates beatles songs with the theme of the 1960s using six stereotypical characters. Jude(Jim Struggess) is a blue collar worker from Liverpool who ventures off to the US to find his father and gets befriended by Maxwell(Joe Anderson) at Princeton. Maxwell's younger sister Lucy(Ava Rachel Wood) is a high school student whose boyfriend Daniel(Spencer Liff) volunteers for Vietnam. Sadie(Dana Fuchs) is a Janis Joplin look-a-like who lives in Greenwich Village and JoJo(Martin Luther) is a Jimi Hendrix look-a-like who becomes a part of Sadie's rock band. Prudence(T.V. Carpio) is the high school dropout who questions her orientation. 

The film uses metaphorical and surrealist imagery during alot of their musical sequences which overshadows the actual characters in the story. For example, at the very beginning you are cringing as you see a sad cheerleader peacefully crossing an active football field singing a popular beatles song in the sunshine while football players are crushing each other and tackling in slow motion around her. I haven't seen such annoying use of slow-motion since Crash(2005).  The various musical sequences themselves occur every 3-5 minutes which becomes tiring and makes the film seem like one long music video of badly sung Beatles cover songs. 

One thing that bothered me was the lack of development from these characters. Prudence in particular seemed to disappear and reappear without explanation and seemed out of place. Plus the bad acting from Ms. Carpio didn't really help much either. Bono doing his rendition of "I am the Walrus" was enough to make me laugh and cry at the same time.

Across The Universe tries too hard to attract a younger generation to the spirit of the 60s and the film becomes more of a mockery of a musical than something that had the potential to liven up this disappointing year. I really wanted to like this film because I enjoy musicals, the 1960s, and beatles songs, however Taymor failed at something that could of been a good commentary for our time. I only hope that this doesn't scare away other directors who are interested in the musical genre and aren't afraid to go beyond convention. See this film with a bunch of friends if you need a good laugh.

My rating: 5.5/10