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ACROSS THE UNIVERSE (***½) |
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Movie Review by:
Jim "Good Old JR" Rutkowski
Directed by: Julie Taymor
Written by: Dick Clement, Ian La Frenais
Starring: Evan Rachel Wood, Martin Luther, Dana Fuchs
Running time: 133 minutes
Released: 09/14/07
Rated PG-13 for some drug content, nudity, sexuality, violence and
language. |
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"Taymor isn’t
tinkering with iconic political and pop culture moments
of the era as much as she’s relying on them to act as
visual touchstones for the comfort of the audience. "
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The last time someone entertained the
idea of matching the Beatles’ music to a screen adventure was in
1978, with “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” And we all know
how that one turned out. Director Julie Taymor’s ambitions shoot a
little higher for her round of Fab Four worship, eschewing satin
jackets and Peter Frampton for a film of singular artistic
representation and copious visual poetry/madness.
A young English shipyard stooge, Jude (Jim Sturgess) travels to
Vietnam-concerned America to find his father. He soon falls under
the spell of Max (Joe Anderson), a reckless college student with an
urge to ditch his pampered life and live in bohemian New York City.
Taking Max up on the offer, Jude immerses himself in his art and his
affection for Max’s younger sister, Lucy (Evan Rachel Wood), while
settling into a commune-like apartment with singer Sadie (Dana
Fuchs), lesbian Prudence (T.V. Carpio), and rocker JoJo (Martin
Luther McCoy). As the stage is set for an explosion of social
uprising, emotional escalation, and painful lessons in broken
hearts, Jude finds his soul changed by this experience, struggling
to maintain his voice in an unraveling world.
After her leashed success with the artist bio-pic “Frida,” Taymor
seems itching to jump back into the warm waters of the cart-wheeling
surreal artistry that defined her 1999 marathon, “Titus.” “Universe”
is a strange musical, especially in the context of today’s classic
pop music marketplace that’s turning everything sonically sacred
into Broadway gold (“Mamma Mia!,” “Movin’ Out”), but its
unpredictability is a major asset. The film represents Taymor at her
most confined, expectation-wise (it is Beatles music, after all),
yet dares her ambition to turn the familiar sights, sounds, and
political aggression of the 1960s into a swirling bouillabaisse of
colors and passion. Sometimes she stumbles, but the fanaticism and
boldness of the picture is exhilarating.
Taymor isn’t tinkering with iconic political and pop culture moments
of the era as much as she’s relying on them to act as visual
touchstones for the comfort of the audience. They are common sights:
war protests, Vietnam hubbub, drug-fueled escapism of the mind, and
flower power. Nothing in the picture is a subtle remark on the
times; Taymor scavenges to mold this hodgepodge of era-specific
melodrama and personalities, smudging the decade into one big
sparkling smear. It extends beyond the Beatles ephemera and cutesy
references (such as Prudence sneaking through a bathroom window, or
another character imagining his life when he’s 64) to include Sadie
and JoJo as doubles for Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, Lucy falling
for a Weathermen-type of radical protest group, and Bono in a cameo
as a trippy Neal Cassady figure named Dr. Robert (singing “I Am the
Walrus”).
Not all of it pieces together smoothly, and you if come to
“Universe” with a mind unprepared for such rampant use of cliché and
smug artist iconography, the film will surely nauseate. “Universe”
is best appreciated more as a shotgun blast of expression than a
traditional story; Taymor gives into her performance art urges often
during the film, which teems with surreal special effects (“Being
for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!” is both the most explosive and trying
of the film’s more extravagant sequences), exaggerated choreography,
and usage of street puppetry. The feature is a circus with tent
poles pushing right through the screen, and I responded to Taymor’s
eccentricities with tremendous joy. She’s willing to flame-out in a
big way with her concepts, and that is a lost art.
In “Universe’s” corner are the celebrated tunes, which are given
proper respect from the cast. In the case of Wood, it demonstrates
she’s a far better singer than she is an actress. Since the film
follows dramatic convention, the opening half, with its lighter set
list (including showstoppers “It Won’t Be Long” and “Hold Me Tight”)
is a breezy affair compared to the drudgery of the second half, with
its darker intentions and calamity. Still, most of the music is
interpreted with gusto and imagination, even when it deviates off
the Beatles track. Imagining “I Want to Hold Your Hand” as a lesbian
anthem for Prudence is a good example.
“Universe” isn’t going to be everyone’s cup of tea, and that’s
exactly how I want my Julie Taymor served. It’s a polarizing
experience, asking the viewer to follow some very extreme and
potentially ludicrous lines of thought and presentation. If given
the mental green light, “Across the Universe” is an oddity that
crosses over to exhilaration and crooked beauty often, keeping the
audience on their toes with this mash note to communicative spirits
and rousing free-range creativity.
This much is inarguable: In the more than two flamboyant hours of
Across the Universe, Julie Taymor doesn't cheat us for a single
second. Drawing upon every visual resource in her rich directorial
palette — after all, she knows film ( Titus, Frida), she knows opera
( The Magic Flute), she knows theatre ( The Lion King), and she sure
knows giant puppets — Taymor paints the screen with such panache,
such joyful verve, that even when it's bad it's still awfully good.
The eye is delighted and, since the whole spectacle is powered by 33
classic Beatles songs, the ear does pretty well too. The result is a
movie musical like none before. |
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ACROSS THE
UNIVERSE © 2007 Sony Pictures Releasing
All Rights Reserved
Review © 2007 Alternate Reality, Inc. |
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