Across the Universe

2007 "All you need is love."
7.3| 2h13m| PG-13| en
Details

When young dockworker Jude leaves Liverpool to find his estranged father in the United States, he is swept up by the waves of change that are re-shaping the nation. Jude falls in love with Lucy, who joins the growing anti-war movement. As the body count in Vietnam rises, political tensions at home spiral out of control and the star-crossed lovers find themselves in a psychedelic world gone mad.

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Reviews

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews
AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
Portia Hilton Blistering performances.
Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.
theresamgill Jude and Prudence show up to town to allow some more songs from the Beatles to be played. Yes sir, Across the Universe is a musical throwing it back to the 60s for a love story of sorts torn away with war and strife and LSD. If this isn't making too much sense, you're not alone. Despite a couple 5 minute naps, I will attempt to review the film as a whole.I think the movie took the easy route right from the start, and it never recovered from the decision. What I'm talking about is story structure. Obviously, all the songs are already there. So how did they make the movie? They took the songs, and they attempted to branch a story out of them to fill in the gaps. The result is high-quality music videos with small periods of "story" in between."Well, Mr. Smarty Pants, do you have any better ideas?" I do, but it's harder to pull off which is why I said they went easy. There are two types of musicals: Those that have the songs in mind and try creating a story around them (like Across the Universe), and those that have a story already in place that will be propelled forward by the songs. Personally, I feel the latter is almost always the better formula to work with, but even then it's not a perfect system. I'm just saying that it could have been a huge turn-around for this film. I mean, there might be a decent story in there somewhere, but I didn't really find it nor have the patience to put effort into searching for it.As this is a musical, we should definitely talk about the songs. Give credit to the film for trying to give modern updates to the songs with flashy graphics to help, but the characters don't add anything because nobody cares about them through the story. I will say, however, one of my biggest issues is that I think most of the songs are worse versions than the originals. Maybe that's a personal bias, who knows. My prime example is "I Want to Hold Your Hand;" the film version slows it down. That ruins the entire beat, and the lyrics aren't powerful enough to carry the weight of a slower song. The vocals of the majority of characters is great, but not everyone hits the right notes, and vocals alone aren't worth an update of these songs.Despite my inner Scrooge to humbug at these modern folks and their attempts to reminisce on previous times, I still found myself singing along with such classics as "Come Together," "Revolution," and "Hey Jude." I wouldn't even call myself the biggest Beatles fan, but those that claim to hate the band probably just haven't heard the right songs.This 2 hour + movie is not worth it for the few notable songs featured. The story drags on, and it ends up giving you the feeling of "Oh, is this the last song? Nope, here's another scene." And thus it goes on and on. Maybe I should just let it be. I don't know.Not sure where it would have fit in, but not seeing "Yesterday" featured was a big bummer. There are a couple other songs I would have preferred, but I honestly am not sure if this was album-based or what and I don't care enough to research it.Just did a little research, and I'm still unsure of how each song was chosen to appear in the film. Oh well.
Paul Kydd Available on Blu-ray Disc (Region B)USA/UK 2007 English (Colour); Musical/Drama/Romance/Fantasy/LGBTQ (Columbia/Revolution/Team Todd); 133 minutes (12 certificate)Crew includes: Julie Taymor (Director); Dick Clement, Ian La Frenais (Screenwriters); Suzanne Todd, Jennifer Todd, Matthew Gross (Producers); Derek Dauchy, Rudd Simmons, Charles Newirth (Executive Producers); Bruno Delbonnel (Cinematographer); Mark Friedberg (Production Designer); Françoise Bonnot (Editor); Elliot Goldenthal (Composer)Cast includes: Evan Rachel Wood (Lucy Carrigan), Jim Sturgess (Jude Feeny), Joe Anderson (Max Carrigan), Dana Fuchs (Sadie), Martin Luther McCoy (Jo-Jo), T.V. Carpio (Prudence); Joe Cocker (Bum, Pimp & Mad Hippie), Bono (Dr Robert), Eddie Izzard (Mr Kite), Salma Hayek (Singing Nurse)Academy Award nomination: Costume Design (Albert Wolsky); Golden Globe nomination: Picture - Musical/Comedy"All you need is love."After jumping ship in the US, a Liverpool dockworker (Sturgess) befriends a college drop-out (Anderson), whose idealistic sister (Wood) he falls for, and is caught up in the anti-Vietnam War fervour, whilst struggling as an artist.A kaleidoscopic, '60s-set jukebox musical written for the big screen (by the English creators of THE LIKELY LADS and PORRIDGE), inspired by over 30 Beatles compositions, the lyrics of which drive the plot forward more than the relatively sparse (spoken) dialogue.Wonderfully dreamlike at times, colourful and dynamic, with well sung, nicely judged performances from the young, fresh leads, and fun musical cameos from Cocker, an American-accented Bono, Izzard, and (multiple) singing nurse Hayek.Blu-ray Extras: Commentary, Featurettes, Deleted/Extended Scenes, Stills Gallery, Behind-the-Scenes Footage. ***½ (7/10)
StudentOfEtherium I liked this movie. That said, I think this movie is terrible. The plot is boring and characters are more often than not pointless. What redeems this movie, and makes it a guilty pleasure are the music scenes. They are creatively designed, and the singing is decent. When viewed as a series of unconnected music videos, this is very enjoyable. However, that doesn't make it a good movie. Without any real narrative structure, the set design is really the only shining part of this movie. I would recommend this movie to people who enjoy creativity, and fans of music, but most other people would just find it boring. So, while flawed, I can still enjoy this movie, and hope to see more like it in the future.
sharky_55 There are and will always be musical diehards who adamantly oppose these types of musical tributes. Who steadfastly believe in maintaining the integrity and artistry of the original Beatles. Those people are missing out on something quite wonderful (and if they listened to Joe Cocker's rendition of With a Little Help from My Friends they would be quite surprised). Across the Universe is a scrambled story, at times valuing its music ahead of its characters or its narrative, and sometimes suffering from the Glee syndrome. That is the mistake of overstuffing the screen-time with as many relevant titles as possible, or in some cases, not exactly valuing the meaning of the song. Both commit the same error with Blackbird, and there are others that seem unnecessary in ATU and hastily speed up the story; Something and Across the Universe come to mind, and Sturgess and Carpio's character names seem there for that sole purpose. But for every one of these there are three others that seem to perfectly encapsulate what our characters are thinking, and what the period is trying to force onto them. There are a few twists on the Beatles classics. Across the backdrop of towering rusty mills, a football team and cheerleader frolic on a turf that is so perfectly torched yellow it must have been Delbonnel's work in post production. Prudence sings I Want To Hold Your Hand in a wistful way, and the object of affection's gender is flipped, and it becomes tragic. Hold Me Tight switches between two aesthetics - the brightly lit and synchronised dancing of a prom, and the grungy underground den of a dance club in Liverpool. Evan Rachel Wood's version manages to capture that young love and one last night feeling much better than the original could. Julie Taymor brings along her expertise as director of the stage musical The Lion King and ATU doesn't hold back an ounce of its theatricality. I've often referred to this film as an assortment of beautiful music videos, and the costuming, production design and eye-poppingly colourful cinematography from Delbonnel certainly speak for themselves. Bono's I Am the Walrus is run through a psychedelic rainbow filter, there are hauntingly slow underwater ballets, strawberries leak red juice and crimson splashes are superimposed with the Vietnam bombings while Anderson and Sturgess harmonise tightly from afar. There are some audacious stylistic set choices. As Jojo (modelled after Jimi Hendrix) arrives in New York, the city lights turns cold and blue-green, beggars and prostitutes serenade him from the street, neon signs buzz from all directions, and hundreds of corporate suits dance rhythmically while he is left out. The group stumble upon a bizarre travelling circus whose costumes and colours pop out in the countryside background. And Max returning injured from war is subject to a dizzyingly absurd dream sequence where the hospital beds churn like a Round Up amusement ride and identical seductive nurses provide the only relief: painkillers. The narrative is one of love first and foremost, and the revolution of the 60s, the counter-culture, the protest of the Vietnam War, all secondary objectives. Taymor prefers to present this via songs rather than exposition or scenes, which is sometimes rushed due to the amount of them (34 separate musical numbers!) Yes it is a little cheesy, the hippie protest not really taken seriously, and the love story one we've seen before, but it is easy to get swept up in the journey. There are some fantastic little touches that scream Beatles love letter rather than a period piece. One is the upbeat timing on Max's frenzied Jude cry that Paul made iconic, which matches perfectly with the moment he sees his dear old friend again in America. Another is the end of Jeff Beck's A Day in the Life, where we frantically zoom in on Jude's discovery of what he thinks is Lucy's death, and the famous long note which took four pianos explodes with the newspapers scraps to reveal him sitting along on the beach, in mourning. It culminates in a roof-top rendition of the ultimate make love not war song of the 60s. Sure, it's a global message but it's much more important for the lovestruck pair than it is for the political and contextual backdrop. Flaws can be found if you are persistent. The story lines are rather shallow; Max comes and goes and never really ends up anywhere after serving, relationship dynamics see-saw in 213 minutes, it's a little sappy at times...there are other problems that could be pointed out with closer analysis. But Across the Universe is stunning to look at, and easy to sing along with.