Okay, so check this out:

An original musical film, Across The Universe is a fictional love story set in the 1960s amid the turbulent years of anti-war protest, the struggle for free speech and civil rights, mind exploration and rock and roll. At once gritty, whimsical and highly theatrical, the story moves from high schools and universities in Massachusetts, Princeton and Ohio to the Lower East Side of Manhattan, the Detroit riots, the killing fields of Vietnam and the dockyards of Liverpool. A combination of live action and painted and three-dimensional animation, the film is paired with many Beatles songs that defined the time.

Here are some of the characters:

Jim Sturgess ....  Jude

Evan Rachel Wood ....  Lucy

Joe Anderson ....  Max

Dana Fuchs ....  Sadie

Cynthia Loebe ....  Diner Waitress

Martin Luther ....  Jo-Jo

T.V. Carpio ....  Prudence

Eddie Izzard ....  Ringmaster


So are images of the Bee Gees and Peter Frampton popping into anyone elses head??

i will watch it with you....

I have heard of most of these actors, ecept T.V. Carpio. This movie will either be a disaster or a total success. There will be no middle ground.

I just saw the commercial for this and BONO is in it!!! He was doing I Am the Walrus. I wasn't expecting that. Now I have to see it. Anyway, here's a clip from it:



I love Eddie Izzard, but what the hell?

A review from Variety:

All you need is love -- for the Beatles, for psychedelic visuals, for ideas about being young in the ‘60s -- to fully enjoy “Across the Universe.” Julie Taymor has delivered an audacious, idiosyncratic creation that plays like a riff on “Hair” with Fab Four cachet, stretching a thin love story across one tumultuous decade. It’s all played with such conviction, that it’s hard to dislike but hard to take seriously. Pic’s commercial prospects look more in line with those of “Rent” than of “Chicago,” though the Taymor touch achieves enough sporadic moments of invention and punch-drunk romanticism to steal the hearts of baby boomers and young female auds in particular.
The flaky, freewheeling tuner features a cast of relative unknowns delivering fresh renditions of 33 classic tunes. The studio paid $10 million for use of the Beatles songs, which didn’t include rights to use the original recordings (and the group is not even mentioned in the ad campaign).

After her Broadway smash “The Lion King” as well as her feverishly operatic pics “Titus” (1999) and “Frida” (2002), it seemed inevitable that Taymor’s visual imagination and flair for spectacle would lead her to direct a movie musical.

Purists may not appreciate what Taymor and scribes Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais have wrought -- a cute romance set against an overly familiar backdrop of Vietnam War protests, mind-altering substances and tortured-artist navel-gazing -- in which spoken dialogue is minimized, allowing the music and lyrics to shape the narrative.

Main characters’ names offer immediate clues about song offerings: Lucy (Evan Rachel Wood) is a beautiful American teen who just kissed her Army-bound boyfriend goodbye, while handsome Jude (Jim Sturgess) hails from (where else?) Liverpool. (Surprisingly, no one pops up with the name Eleanor Rigby.) Jude quits his shipyard job, heads for the U.S. and finds himself at Princeton, where he befriends Lucy’s smart, rebellious older brother, Max (Joe Anderson).

Unwilling to follow the blueprint laid out for him by his rigidly upper-crust parents, Max moves with Jude to New York, where they rent a room from foxy musician and mother hen Sadie (Dana Fuchs). Also joining the burgeoning bohemian enclave are the sexually confused Prudence (T.V. Carpio); soulful guitarist Jo-Jo (Martin Luther McCoy), who gets a dynamite entrance courtesy of Joe Cocker on “Come Together”; and Lucy, whose blossoming relationship with Jude forms the heart of the movie.

All this plays more compellingly (if not coherently) onscreen than it sounds on paper, thanks to a musically driven storytelling style that leaps from song to song, with occasional dialogue snippets serving as connective tissue. Whatever their reservations, viewers will be curious to see how Taymor (with song producers T-Bone Burnett, Elliot Goldenthal and Teese Gohl) adapts and reinterprets a classic repertoire.

If Taymor’s choices sometimes border on the obvious, they can also be weirdly arresting. Carpio’s lovely, quavering rendition of “I Want to Hold Your Hand” becomes an ode to unrequited lesbian longing; “Let It Be” is reimagined as a gospel-infused elegy for slain U.S. troops and victims of the 1967 Detroit riots; and “Because,” sung by multiple individuals writhing nude underwater, achieves a haunting, frozen-in-time lyricism.

Not all the numbers are equally inspired, and some early perfs, such as buddy anthem “With a Little Help From My Friends,” feel stranded between naturalism and artifice. Taymor is more assured in her bold strokes; her most intricately staged number, “I Want You (She’s So Heavy),” grimly surveys the war recruitment effort as Max and other unwilling conscripts are stripped, physically examined and expelled into the jungles of Vietnam.

As the war takes centerstage and contempo parallels loom large, Lucy’s increasingly radical activism forces a wedge between her and aspiring painter Jude. But the dramatic conception here is predictable and generic.

As if to compensate, the musical numbers become progressively more flamboyant and visually unhinged. A cameo by Bono as a sort of godfather among hippies (delivering a forceful cover of “I Am the Walrus”) shifts the movie into a hallucinatory realm, with a tie-dye color scheme that suggests scenes were shot during an acid trip with Baz Luhrmann. Viewers who like movies to reflect their out-of-body experiences will gladly inhale, but for others, the excess may seem off-putting. Call it “Flabby Road.”

The widely publicized clash between Taymor and Revolution Studios topper Joe Roth over final cut will be blamed by some for the production’s disjointed feel, though coherence doesn’t seem to have been a top priority from the get-go. With its truncated performances and their sometimes arbitrary placement within the narrative, “Across the Universe” rarely achieves the organic flow, the sense of characters expressing themselves through unimpeded song, exemplified by two very different recent musicals, “Dreamgirls” and “Once.”

Thesps acquit themselves admirably on both singing and acting fronts. Sturgess’ soft eyes, even softer voice and winning demeanor make this an auspicious leading-man debut, while Wood, who had no prior singing training, impresses with a soprano that matches her acting in emotional directness. Eddie Izzard and “Frida” star Salma Hayek have fleeting cameos.

Production elements are intensely stylized, with art direction and costumes delivering a gaudy approximation of ‘60s counterculture. Goldenthal, Taymor’s partner and frequent collaborator, also composed the score.


Evan Rachel Wood, Jim Sturgess and T.V. Carpio star in the sometimes-hallucinatory Beatles jukebox tuner 'Across the Universe.'

Ouch.



Yes, I'll be seeing it, too.

Some trailers. It's reminding me of a cross between Hair and Moulin Rouge. Maybe it wont suck? Dunno.



(I've Just Seen a Face)

It Won't Be Long

(Girl/Helter Skelter)

Okay, you get the idea. There's tons of them on YouTube.

Okay, a couple more. But just because it's Bono!!

BONO as Dr. Robert. He's interviewed too.

Now that's bettah!

That version of It Won't Be Long is terrible!

On Friday, Julie Taymor (the director and the one who thought the whole thing up) was on Oprah Winfrey. Oprah was obviously very impressed by the movie, I didn't realize that she was a big Beatles fan.

Anyways, Julie said that she herself got to SIT NEXT TO PAUL MCCARTNEY while showing him the movie. And Oprah's like "Oh my god, did you really? I always thought I was gonna marry him!" She was really blown away by that, she should just have him on her show! And then Oprah asked her how it felt. And Julie says that it was the most terrifying moment ever! All of us ladies can imagine how she felt, 'cause it seems like even at his age Paul still attracts females, and she didn't want to make a fool out of herself or whatever. I know that if I was put in that situation I would be sooooo nervous! And I thought it was really cute that when the movie was playing All My Loving, Paul was singing along to it under his breath! And Julie asked him what he thought of it when it was over and he said "What's not to like?" (And Oprah was flipping out meanwhile, she even had tears in her eyes at one point 'cause it brings back Beatle memories...)

So, I hope this is a good movie, I really think that it will be. Everyone seemed to be very excited about it, and Paul seemed like he loved it. And at the end of the Oprah show, four of the actors/actresses from the movie came out and sang first Blackbird, then All My Loving, Don't Let Me Down, and All You Need Is Love. I'm going to see it when it comes out this weekend, so let's hope it's a good one!

Oprah is a BIG Beatles fan. I read her magazine (yes, I fail at life. whatevs) and she's ALWAYS making Beatles references in the article titles or whatever.

Anyway, I still really want to see this movie. Damn my parents for not settling down near a movie theatre.

I just saw it tonight...it is amazing!  

Alright, I FINALLY saw this movie with my sister on Friday night, the opening day, at least in my area! Wow, it was amazing! The actors all did a great job, and sang very well, too. Definitly go see this movie, any Beatles fan will love it! I'm probably gonna see it again with my parents.  

I saw it tonight. It was very well done. I loved the way they portrayed what was going on at that time and how people were feeling. The Let It Be sequence made me cry! Very good how they included the Detroit riots with the death of the Vietnam vet which kind of began the whole end of the American dream. But they did gloss over the whole Civil Rights movement for the rest of the movie. Guess that wasn't the focus of the characters though. The Uncle Sam part was a bit too heavy on the propaganda I thought, but still very cool. I LOVED Bono's Ken Kesey type character. He was PERFECT!!! He nailed it. His mock California American accent was great. He needs to do more acting. I swear. The other part that I thought was hysterical was Joe Cocker showing up in the subway as a bum! That was so funny and perfect! He did a great version of Come Together. Very, very cool. Anyway, I think you all should see it. Beatles music or not it was a great film. Salma Hyeck was out of place though and the Eddie Izzard part wasn't really needed. Made the movie too long. The Jude character was great. He sang his songs perfectly. Although he sang with more of an accent than the Beatles ever did! I found that interesting. I mean, I wonder if the Beatles tried to sing without the accent or if it just happened that way. I know early on they immitated American singers, but I don't think they did it later on. But I digress. My point is: SEE IT!

Hey, was it Bono singing Lucy in the Sky at the end? If so I thought he did a great job. Better than his version of I am the Walrus. If it was him doing Lucy. Whoever it was it was great.

Quoted from Mairi

Oprah is a BIG Beatles fan. I read her magazine (yes, I fail at life. whatevs) and she's ALWAYS making Beatles references in the article titles or whatever.

Anyway, I still really want to see this movie. Damn my parents for not settling down near a movie theatre.

You HAVE to see it Mairi. You would love it. How far could a movie theater be from you? I can't imagine.

At one point in the movie the characters are talking about ways to get out of the draft. I thought it was funny that the guy decided he would rather go to Vietnam than Canada! They go: "Montreal's cool" and he goes, "they speak French!" Cute.

I live about an hour away from the nearest movie theatre, and it only plays one movie at a time. I've been thinking about making the trip, though. If it's as good as you say it is- and I suspect it will be.

It will be well worth the trip. Trust me. It's a movie you have to see on the big screen. DVD won't do it justice. Talk a friend that drives into taking you!

I never get to see these things. We never have these venues in the UK!
I want to see Love & Across the Universe, but that means i have to travel to the
US. sorry, i'm i moaning!

Yeah but Across the Universe is a movie. Isn't it already playing in the UK? LOVE is another thing altogether. I mean, even people in the US have trouble getting to Vegas sometimes. Maybe they'll do a LOVE tour eventually. They really should because it was f-ing amazing. As was Across the Universe. I can't believe quality Beatles related stuff is being put out lately. Maybe it's time for a new biopic. Or maybe we'd be pushing our luck.

I read this review. Not everybody seems to be happy with this film:

Quoted Text

Out of all the legendary bands you can choose from to design a soundtrack for a movie, director Julie Taymor sided with The Beatles. Therein lies a problem. Only half of the members of The Beatles are still alive today. How do you score a movie when half of the band can't even play?

In Julie Taymor's eyes, the answer was simple. Her latest film, "Across the Universe," tells a love story much like a musical does, but to the tunes of The Beatles. The combination seems fascinatingly original, but the content may be too simple and tiresome.

Everyone, meet Jude, your main character. Now, say "Hey Jude". Congratulations, you've just had your first lesson in one of the many references to The Beatles lore in "Across the Universe." Sounds a little easy doesn't it? Well, the most fun you will get out of "Across the Universe" is exactly that.

The story, hidden underneath all of the psychedelic musical scenes, is disappointingly cliched and simple. Jude falls in love with Lucy as the nationwide happenings of the 60s tears them apart. Along the way, as if to heighten the dullness of the story, Taymor laces the scenes with lyrics that play mistakenly as coincidence to the story. Needless to say, it's easy to lose interest without the music.

For an aesthetic art form, this film is experimentally brilliant. It is doubtful, though, these images will replace or even be remembered when hearing a Beatles' song replayed on the radio. The bottom line is, "Across the Universe," brings nothing new to the table other than a unique visual interpretation of an original soundtrack from some of the greatest songwriters of all time. If The Beatles catch your fancy, this film a sure fire enjoyment. If nothing else, just "Let it Be".

of coursethe film doesn't come out anywhere but London here, otherwise I would have seen it! I downloaded the soundtrack though, it's quite good! I've just seen a face is great!

Quoted from Bobber

I read this review. Not everybody seems to be happy with this film:

That reviewer has a very negative way of looking at it. It was all in good fun the little jokes and references. Meant to be obvious. The actors did a great job. They were all charismatic and fun to watch. The images ring true to what was going on back then, and of course to sum up the sixties in a 2+ hour movie isn't going to be easy but I'd say Taymor did a pretty good job. It's better than most of the stuff I've seen lately. And I'm not easily impressed with anything involving Beatles. I thought for sure I'd hate it, but I didn't. But then everyone's different.

Quoted from Sandra

I thought for sure I'd hate it, but I didn't. But then everyone's different.

I thought for sure I'd like it, but I ended up hating it. The ONLY thing that made the movie worthwhile for me was the nice eye candy (Jim Sturgess), and even that got old 20 minutes into it. I read one review when the movie came out that mentioned that you would have to have experienced the 60s to really appreciate the movie, so maybe that's why I couldn't really get it into it. But I will say that the imagery was fascinating at times. The "Because" scene sticks out in my memory.

I took my friend with me in hopes that it would turn her on to the Beatles, and while she did love the songs, she is only interested in the soundtrack versions... so that completely backfired. She has no Beatles albums but regularly jams out to Evan Rachel Wood. Go figure.   I wonder how many other people in the younger generation went and bought the soundtrack without bothering to explore further.

Try not to worry too much, nothing_is_real. You never know when the seed will blossom. I don't know when my interest blossomed into mania, but it certainly lay fallow a while.

Quoted from nothing_is_real

I thought for sure I'd like it, but I ended up hating it. The ONLY thing that made the movie worthwhile for me was the nice eye candy (Jim Sturgess), and even that got old 20 minutes into it. I read one review when the movie came out that mentioned that you would have to have experienced the 60s to really appreciate the movie, so maybe that's why I couldn't really get it into it. .

'

Uh, I didn't experience the sixties just so you know. I enjoyed it because it was pretty well done. They didn't completely ruin the songs and I thought the storyline was interesting. Maybe the fact that I had really low expectations helped too. Anyway, I don't think you would have to have experienced the sixties to enjoy this. I mean, the events they portray are pretty much common knowledge to most people.

Quoted from Sandra

'

Uh, I didn't experience the sixties just so you know. I enjoyed it because it was pretty well done. They didn't completely ruin the songs and I thought the storyline was interesting. Maybe the fact that I had really low expectations helped too. Anyway, I don't think you would have to have experienced the sixties to enjoy this. I mean, the events they portray are pretty much common knowledge to most people.

I didn't mean to imply that you were older than you are. And I realize that you don't have to be of that generation to understand the movie, just maybe to fully embrace it. For some people.

I happen to think the storyline was nothing but a giant cliche - which would have been okay if the musical performances had been decent. But most of them, particularly anything that was sung by Evan Rachel Wood, just made me cringe. That's just me though.

Quoted from nothing_is_real

...I happen to think the storyline was nothing but a giant cliche...

Could anything better really be expected?

Most movies based on the sixties are cliche. I wasn't looking for this movie to be art of any kind. Anyway, I think it helped that I thought it would suck and that I'd be tortured throughout. I was surprised that I was actually entertained. I liked Sturgess and the other guy. I loved Bono's Kesey character and the Joe Cocker part completey surprised me. I had no idea he was in it. I thought he was awesome. So that was enough for me to be entertained. The worst part was Evan Rachel Wood. She's kind of dull. Most movies are crap anymore anyway but at least this one had decent songs.  

Quoted from Klang

Could anything better really be expected?

totally agree, Klang.

I was THERE in the sixties, so naturally I revere my tangible and substantial memories of that era. I'm extremely proud of growing up in that period. I depise all these recent superficial attempts to "cash in" on the Fab . I find "Love" and "Across The Universe" prime examples of this.

Quoted from 829

totally agree, Klang.

I was THERE in the sixties, so naturally I revere my tangible and substantial memories of that era. I'm extremely proud of growing up in that period. I depise all these recent superficial attempts to "cash in" on the Fab . I find "Love" and "Across The Universe" prime examples of this.

We've had the conversation before. I really can't see either of your examples as being "superficial attempts to 'cash in'", One is just a movie containing a soundtrack of Beatles covers. So what. Like someone else said, one thing that might come out of that is new, younger Beatles fans. I know you didn't like the movie, but that shouldn't make a difference. And unless you want to accuse The Beatles of cashing in on themselves you can't really refer to Love in that way either. It was, after all, George Harrison's idea. And there doesn't seem to be anything superficial about it.

And Btw, I was also there in the 60's, but I don't see what difference that makes.

Quoted from BlueMeanie

We've had the conversation before.

yeah, we did...but as you notice, my comment was addressed to Klang, if I'm not mistaken. I reserve the right--as you do--to reiterate any of my formerly held opinions--since the subject was rehashed NOT by me, but by another poster.

Quoted from 829

yeah, we did...but as you notice, my comment was addressed to Klang, if I'm not mistaken. I reserve the right--as you do--to reiterate any of my formerly held opinions--since the subject was rehashed NOT by me, but by another poster.

Blimey, excuse me for posting! So I'm allowed an opinion of what you said only if it's addressed to me? You made a statement on a public forum. PM Klang if you don't want anyone else to comment.

"ATU" & "LOVE" are sore spots w/ me


(me, I'll just sit patiently waiting for LET IT BE to make it's "official" dvd debut rather than endure this god-aweful drek from Beatle parasites (directors & "producers")

I just saw this movie Sunday night and I loved it!

Warning: Minor spoilers.

I really had no idea what to expect. I knew that there were Beatles covers in the film, and