Across The Universe

And the award for best trailer of 2007 and maybe even of ever in the whole wide world goes to...

*drum roll*

Across The Universe!!!

*wild applause*

The other nominees smile for the camera, the makers of The Bratz Movie smiling hardest of all. The Dragon Wars guys clap enthusiastically, though inside they are already planning the fastest way home to drink themselves into a bitter stupor.

The thing about the trailer for Across The Universe is that, well... it is the greatest trailer ever. For the first time in a while the trailer actually sold me on the film with no help at all from any synopsis, cast list, or director. I've heard Julie Taymor's done neat things. I thought The Lion King stage show was pretty dazzling. I heard Titus was pretty balls. The end. I didn't really care that A.t.U was hers. But the trailer... my goodness, it was mind blowing.

The genius of the trailer is that it tricks you. It presents itself at first by saying "Hello, nice to meet you. I am just another cliche love story, but I use Beatles tunes to call myself a musical."

"Ho hum," says I in response.

"But wait!" the trailer says. "Just hear me out! I'm not just a plain old love story! I was kidding before when I said that!" and then it explodes. It explodes everywhere. There is an explosion of music, of color, of action, of unbelievable imagery. There is an emotional progression to the trailer, an awe-inspiring swell of sound and visuals and puppets and Eddie Izzard.

"FUCK YOU," the trailer screams with glee. "I'M NOT WHAT YOU THOUGHT I WAS AT ALL! I WILL BOGGLE YOUR MIND! COME SEE ME!"

So I did. I went and saw it, my mind prepped to be boggled.

Now... here's the thing. Some might say that I just got overexcited about it. That I had simply psyched myself up so that my expectations, once again, exceeded any possibility of being satisfied. But see... that's not what happened. I didn't tell myself that this was going to be amazing. I had been told already. The trailer told me. It screamed at me, even. "FUCK YOU" it said, if you will remember.

I had no idea what the movie was going to involve. I had no idea the story it was going to tell. I had no idea what it was going to dwell on. I had no preconceived notions. I just knew, I knew because I had been told, that Across The Universe was something special, something different, something unique and influential and arresting.

I had been lied to.

Across The Universe wasn't... bad. Well, it wasn't horrible. I guess it was bad. And it most certainly wasn't good. It was a disjointed, incoherent, inconsistent, unemotional, rambling, scattered, cliche ball of self-indulgent, half-realized, two-dimensional, wannabe pop art.

Sorry Julie...

Some say it was just a love letter to the '60s. The revolution, the image heavy creative expression, all of which was encapsulated by Beatles music. Yummy.

I LOVE THE BEATLES!!! you and the rest of the world says. I KNOW, RIGHT!?

But if it was a love letter, it was, and I'm sorry about lame phrasing, written by someone without a heart. Or maybe just a heart made of poo-poo doo-doo.

I heard a rumor that Taymor had nearly a whopping 90% of the music sung live on the set! Exclamation point! Boy, the sound in the film is so over processed you sure can't tell! But that doesn't matter. Many of the covers are really nice. A great stand-out for me is Joe Cocker's "Come Together" cameo. Really really fantastic. Eddie Izzard's Mr. Kite is pretty friggin' swell, too. And "Let It Be" is really... really nice.

And most of the visuals that accompany the songs are really astounding. Everything surrounding Mr. Kite's musical romp was thumbs up great. The choreography to songs like "I Want You" is not only really freakin' creative, but superbly executed.

So if all this is so nifty, why does the movie blow my nuts?

'Cause it doesn't MEAN anything! A lot of the musical segments make for reeeally neat music videos. The end. They have no bearing on one another, on the film as a whole, on any over lying message, and they certainly don't come together to form a coherent "love letter" so don't dare spew that jargon at me, you.

There is no progression to the film as a whole. The musical numbers don't build on each other. Not emotionally, not thematically, nothing. And they certainly have no baring on the half of the film that serves as some semblance of a... plot. "Plot."

The film doesn't amount to anything. There is no energy to half the songs, never mind any part that isn't musical at all. There are characters that serve no purpose other than to provide a stretch of an excuse to sing another song (Dear Prudence) and plot points that aren't fully realized and some that are completely assumed.

The music meant nothing to the film, the film meant nothing to the characters, and the characters meant nothing to me. There was no emotional release. There was nothing. It was nothing. It meant nothing. Nothing.

How can you do that? How can you demonstrate for over two hours great promise, the ability to paint a beautiful picture with song and mesmerizing images and have it mean nothing?

Because that's all it was. A beautiful picture. A painting. A painting inspired by the 60's, overwrought with references and artistic imitation in the form of an homage. But paintings are 2-D, and may generate some "Oohs" and "Aahs" but evoke no emotional response. Not the kind of response this should have garnered at least.

It was just a freaking over extended music video for Christ sake, stretched way too thin.

At least Hard Days Night and Yellow Submarine had some fun with themselves. And were both under an hour and a half.