Across the Universe

The limits of interpretation apply to Across the Universe. The Beatles, icons of the 60s, have their music served up as story and discussion about two youths who fall in love but are torn apart by the political struggles to stop Vietnam War. A different Beatles song lays out a different emotion and thought for the short history of the characters and their times.

The film is a true musical in the sense that the lyrics are suppose to be as important and as meaningful as anything piece of dialogue, but the film over values the meaning of the music of the Beatles. The band dealt with both pop tunes and explorations in rock and darker subjects, but the idea that some of their songs are good for political climate of the 1960s is much less believable. The Beatles were politically aware but most of their progression with material and subject matter was personal. The few times they did outright deal with social change it was done in the most general way. The film milks those for songs for all they are worth and even extends the meaning of other songs to prove points that had little to do with original intention and isn't very believable now.

For Julie Taymour the filmmaker the story matters very little. She continues her exploration of mixing styles and sets to create visual poetry, but she underwhelms in Across the Universe. A few ideas and visuals are good, but she keeps the visua moments spread too far and too tin over the course of the film. Each new visual moment has a new set up and design and lasts many seconds instead of minutes. When Federico Fellini made Juliet of the Spirits, he tied the visuals together for twenty minutes of length sometimes. He understood the visuals were important, but it was more interesting in how they could be brought together through editing. Julie Taymour tries to impress us more with exaggerated production sets up. She doesn't link the visuals to that many impressive filmmaking sequences.