Across the Universe: Style >> Substance
No, I hadn’t forgotten about this blog at all. I’ve just been busy/not had the immediate desire to write something. Let’s face it; the Sweeney Todd Review, though worthy of a Nobel Prize, was a long piece of bloggage. Though I’ve felt looking at my blog up until now with the Sweeney pictures gives me the appearance of being sinister and…throat slicey. Now, I’ma go for Beatle-loving stoner (is there any other kind ;?). And I’ve been lying to myself, saying that if I write for this blog and not my science paper, then I’m wasting my time. Well, I haven’t been writing my science paper (and it’s due in a week), so what the hell? I’ve got something to say about Across the Universe.
When I saw this movie in theaters (back when it was only released in Toronto during the Film Festival), I had felt a little let down by it. I’d been told by someone that the trailer looks amazing, but the movie doesn’t deliver. I fell in love with the trailer, but I came out of the movie feeling something was missing. I’ve since determined that Across the Universe makes a much better soundtrack then a movie.
Listen, it’s The Beatles. I’ve heard enough anti-establishment types moan that they are overblown and put undeservedly on some sort of musical and cultural pedestal.
I’m not going to argue that, because music and popular culture is extremely subjective, but gawd-damn it, it’s the friggin Beatles. Personally, when I was a child the only Beatles song they expose you to is Yellow Submarine and Octopus’s Garden, two songs to this day I dislike, and thats all you think they are. Since I fell in love with them a year ago, I’ve begun to think the Ontario government is doing a disservice to its children by not taking one of those boring History classes all about Metis treaties and Bills of Rights and slipping in at least a week of schooling about the Beatles and their influence in society. I’m actually serious; we learn about History and Math and Science and Art, but we can come out of school being extremely lame by not knowing something as universal as “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” is one of the most influential albums on popular and rock music ever. A worksheet and maybe an in-class showing of “A Hard Day’s Night” is all I’m asking for. Anyways, I digress, because I make no sense.
Like I said, it’s the Beatles; you can’t go wrong with that. Except…they didn’t really go right. They kinda didn’t go anywhere at all. Believe me, I love me some trippy movies and I love some serious political movies, but they story was so thin and the musical sequences so out of place that one felt like a distraction to the other. The movie is very aesthetically pleasing in places (see above), and I think they executed updating the songs for the most part very well, but I also feel that, armed with the entire Beatles catalog to make a coherent plot out, *I*, someone with no musical or fictional experience, could have put together a much better storyline that had the music flowing and relevant and fantabulous without being showy and blatantly saying “look, Beatles songs. See our genious!” . (This isn’t a challenge I’m issuing to myself, or anyone else, by the way; just a point I’m trying to make about how much they blew this)
Don’t get me wrong’; some scenes worked great. I especially liked the interpretation of “I Want You” using Uncle Sam and the she’s so heavy line was perfect. I also liked “Happiness is a Warm Gun,” “Strawberry Fields Forever,” “Revolution”, and “Let it Be” as they seemed relevant to the plot. But most of the other songs felt like “look, we’ve shoved another Beatles song in here because it vaguely relates to the mess that we’ve concocted up to show off Beatles songs.”It was a very circular and unsatisfying way of doing things.
And dear lord, what the hell was that part in the middle with “For the Benefit of Mr. Kite?” My best friend rented it and I went over to see it with her, which was the second time I’d seen it and realized that it really wasn’t all that good. I got up and left the room when this came on. WTF?!
The characters felt ill-developed; I really wish Jojo and Sadie got more story and they had eliminated the pointless Prudence altogether. I didn’t really care for Lucy; the only two I liked (other than Saide and JoJo) were Max and Jude (who, by the way, is the yummiest Paul McCartney sort-of-resembler I’ve ever seen. Mmmmm).
But like I’ve already said (twice), its a very good soundtrack to listen to in conjunction with listening to Beatles songs on the ol’ iPod, and the musical sequences themselves look like fun music videos to the updated songs. I just wish the trailer hadn’t shown the best scenes and left the rest of the overly long and under-developed movie to completely underwhelm me. Oh wells, its still the friggin Beatles. I loves them so.
Still really worth seeing. Especially relevant for today. We need more art, more rebellion, more standing up against the government. We need passion, a passion that is sorely lacking amoung this generation.
This movie was so uplifting. The whole project felt like a work of love. The cast is so pure and beautiful you can’t help fall in love with the whole experience. Dare i say, by bringing the songs down to their simplest form some became even more beautiful. And yes, it brings it all back. I was in the midst of it all and wish the youth of today had more guts. You’ll all be walking around with chips in your body soon because you don’t love your freedom, you like your stupor.