A little too vast

To quote Eddie Izzard in Across the Universe:

...and it's a lot of explanation, but don't worry about it, kids. Ok. Just tune in, turn on, drop out, drop in, switch off, switch on, and explode.

That about sums up the movie for me. There's a lot of explanation, kids, but don't worry about it. Instead, enjoy the big production numbers and the pretty singing. We're going to avoid stuff like true characterization and a solid narrative thread in favor of archetypical characters and some pretty singing. The is a big Broadway production of a film, with huge production values and some really neat musical numbers that add up to far less than the sum of its parts.

The film - in case you weren't aware - is told through some of the best-written pop songs ever, creations of the Lennon-McCartney and Harrison hit factory. We get a beautiful recreations of "I Wanna Hold Your Hand", "If I Fell", "I've Just Seen a Face", and thirty-some more Beatle songs. All are performed admirably and most were apparently and impressively recorded without overdub. Sprinkled between the various Beatle songs are dozens and dozens more Beatle references, making the film into a bit of a Where's Waldo for Beatle fans, a game that I knew to play and enjoyed throughout but that The Girl (a bigger Beatle fans) wasn't playing because she was pretty much bored throughout the film.

I do have to admit that a number of the production numbers were well done, expecially the reworking of "Let It Be" (also audio only available, sorry) and "Come Together" (only audio available, sorry) to show the inroduction and background of one of the supporting characters. The coreography during the "Come Together" number is easily, I thought, the most impressive, but throughout the whole of the film, the songs just don't make enough of a story to let us truly connect with the characters. As a Broadway play, this just might be really good, but it didn't work for me as a film.

After half an hour, however, The Girl and I were both bored as the concept that "hey, they've reworked Beatle songs" had already worn quite thin. Then the movie kept going for another hundred minutes.

Eventually, we broke down into the game of asking each other questions - something that really is much better played at home rather than in the theater.

• Hey, there's Bono.
• Wouldn't they deport him again if he did that?
• Isn't that Salma Hayek?
Are they really trying to force a Jim Hendrix character and a Janis Joplin character into the story?
• Does the lead guy look like Paul McCartney?
• Didn't Moulin Rouge open with exactly that same song line? Or maybe he looks more like Ewan McGregor.
• Hey, that's Joe Cocker.
• Are they gonna force a happy ending in here?

It's a neat idea. More of the performances are good. The production values are high. But it's not a good film.

If you want to see more, check the following videos that I couldn't fit into my review (and thanks to thekato for posting these):

• "For the Benefit of Mr. Kite"
• "I Am the Walrus"
• "I Want You"
• Hey Jude
• "Revolution"
• "Why Don't We Do It in the Road"

Oddly, the best part of the movie-going experience this weekend was in one of the skant two trailers tacked onto the front of Across the Universe. It's the trailer for Juno: