What Do The Critics Say?

"It isn't just another movie about the momentous events of the '60s, but rather a valentine to the era's artistic and idealistic spirit as symbolized by the music of The Beatles. As to be expected from the director of Titus and Frida, Taymor has made a visually arresting film, chock full of dreamy sequences painted with psychedelic power. While many musicals often feel like extended music videos, Taymor has truly created a visual poem with the strikingly beautiful Across the Universe. This is the most unique and visceral film you will see all year, and it should likely earn Oscar nominations for cinematography and art direction." Stax IGN MOVIES "A Taymor triumph. A mélange of creativity using the Beatles music to express a generation in full. The fresh interpretation of the music is perfection." Victoria Alexander FILMSINREVIEW "Across the Universe captured my heart, and I realized that falling in love with a movie is like falling in love with another person." Stephen Holden NEW YORK TIMES "I'm embarrassed by how much I liked this movie. Simply catching all the Beatles references alone makes me feel like a major Beatles nerd, but I'm sure it's a feeling I'd be able to share with the zillions of die-hard fans across this rock 'n roll universe." Jeffrey Chen WINDOW TO THE MOVIES

"The cast of unknowns delivers, and then some. Making his film debut, newcomer Sturgess is a particular standout, looking very much like one of the Beatles boys in their heyday. All the rest of the supporting cast does a wonderful job adding their own unique reinterpretations to the songs (and, yes, both "Hey, Jude" and "Dear Prudence" pop up). The big fun with Across the Universe, however, are the cameo appearances: Eddie Izzard sings "Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite" as a surreal circus ringleader; Joe Cocker sings “Come Together” alternating between a pimp, bum and hippie; Salma Hayek takes nursing to a new level in a "Happiness Is a Warm Gun" number; and finally, U2’s Bono sings "I Am the Walrus" John Lennon would be proud." Kit Bowen HOLLYWOOD.COM "A magical mystery tour with the power to restore one's faith in both movies and music. For my money, Across the Universe isn't simply a good movie; it's one of the best films of the year." Matt Brunson CREATIVE LOAFING "The story takes place during the 1960s, the decade the Beatles were active. The film works best if you have a more than passing knowledge not only of the Beatles music but of the 1960s. A resplendent feast for the eyes." Edward Havens FILMJERK "Across the Universe isn't beholden to any stage incarnation. It owes its vision to the vibrant imagination of its director, who created a musical that reminds us how cultural-political events can change our tune." Lisa Kennedy DENVER POST

The Inside Story Julie Taymor, the groundbreaking visionary behind Revolution Studios’ new film "Across the Universe", says that she first conceived a film that would, in her words, "investigate the '60s. It had to penetrate all levels of the Beatles songs. From the love songs to the political songs, the music and the film would not just reflect the microcosm of a character’s experience, but, from my perspective, would also represent the macrocosm of the events that are happening in the world." For Taymor, though the film is set a generation back, making the story and the film fresh and alive for today’s audiences was the entire point. "I really want young people to see the passion in this movie; to see with what fervor these characters invested themselves into social movements as well as self-exploration," she says. "I hope it really speaks 'across the universe' and across cultures; that anybody could identify with the situations and the events that are happening in this movie." According to Jennifer Todd, "Memento" producer and co-founded of the production company Team Todd, the film is an artistic statement from Taymor. "In addition to being a unique voice, Julie is the hardest-working director I’ve ever worked with," she says. "It’s an amazingly satisfying experience to work with someone who lives and breathes the movie morning, noon, and night. One particular weekend, we went away and came back to discover that an entire new sequence had been invented. Because she’s like that, she attracts people who want to work just as hard to achieve her vision." Producer Matthew Gross, who generated the project, concurs. "Julie is a national treasure," he says. "She is a true artist, not only does she bring visual appeal, but she has just the right touch with the singers and dancers, which was so necessary for this film. The work she did in Titus and Frida show her incredible vision. In addition, because everyone wants to work with Julie Taymor; and with good reason, she is able to attract top artists and amazing talent to work with her. She is a tremendous asset to the film in every way." Unlike most musicals, where a story comes first and songs are inserted in at key points, the songs created the story. "Beginning with over two hundres songs written by the Beatles, we eventually chose thirty three that we felt best told the story of a generation and a time," says Taymor. "The film is an original musical and it has an original story; one you’ve never seen before, inspired by Beatles’ music in a way that you haven’t heard before," Todd explained. "The entire concept of this musical," Taymor says, "is that the lyrics will tell the story." Although Taymor was only in her early teens in the 1960's, the story was inspired by her childhood observations. "Lucy and Max, the brother and sister, are modeled slightly after my own older brother and sister, and I’m Julia, the young girl who’s watching. During that time, I was a voyeur to what my parents were going through with teenagers and then college students who were going through the radical political movement: the draft, the hippies, the drugs." The filmmakers goal was to translate the passion and feeling of the 60s and have it resonate in a way that made it feel as contemporary as possible. In order to bring the era to life, Taymor and screenwriters Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais created an entirely new story, using the songs to guide their way. The only cast member with major film experience is Evan Rachel Wood. Taymor notes, "She’s so young and nobody really has seen her grow into a woman; in this movie, she grows into a full-fledged adult, serious woman. She’s going to be a major discovery for people. Plus, no one even knew she could sing." Wood says her greatest challenge was "If I Fell". "I’ve never had any training in singing, and that song goes very, very high. It’s also the most emotional song I sing. So I had to prepare myself emotionally for the character at that moment and also put it into song while also remembering what my voice had to do. As I was learning the song and trying to figure out how to sing it, they brought Jim Sturgess into the room so I could sing it to him. It was the very best I ever sang it. It took my mind off what I was doing and freed me up." Open casting calls were held in England for the role of Jude. Taymor said she could "tell from a tape of Jim Sturgess that he was the one, even before she met him in person." Sturgess who makes his major-studio debut in "Across the Universe" decribes Taymor as "brilliant. She’s an endless head of ideas. She has a definite idea of what she wants to see, but also allows her actors the room to bring their own ideas. She just takes it all in." A big highlight of working on the production for Sturgess, was the day Bono came to set and told the young actor that he liked Sturgess’s voice. When Taymor met Brit Joe Anderson, she found it interesting that he did not even want to audition for the role of Jude. "When I went to London he auditioned for me, but he said, you know, 'I’m not that character: I am Max,' so even he knew that his own personality would be better suited to that. And he looked like Evan, so he was really the right mix to play her brother Max." Dana Fuchs was cast as Sadie. "I felt like I was in a movie when I was on the phone with Julie and she was telling me that I got the part. There was no one there to witness. I was shocked," she recalls, "on top of getting the part, to find out she wrote it for me was amazing. She said there was no other Sadie." Sadie’s partner in the movie is the character of Jo-Jo, who is also a musician. "He comes from Detroit, comes from soul music, and hooks up with these young strays and he becomes part of Sadie’s band. He transforms in front of you, going from the slicked-back hair to the wild afro." To play Jo-Jo, Taymor called upon Martin Luther McCoy, a singer and a guitar player in New York without much acting experience. Taymor says he proved himself to be "a phenomenal actor" as well as musician. T.V. Carpio, who plays Prudence, was another discovery. Along with having a beautiful singing voice, T.V. is a dancer and former ice skater. Carpio recalls, "As Jim said to me, in the very beginning: 'I’m just desperate to do what Julie needs from us.' We wanted so much to make her vision come alive." "Julie really brings out the best in you," Wood says. "She can make you do things that you never knew you could do. I love how she brings that out of people. You can’t be afraid and you can’t have any fear. She throws you into the deep end and somehow you’re just in there and you swim there." Wood says you realize "I didn’t know I could do this." Bono, who was in the middle of a world tour with U2, managed to fit in two days on set as 'Dr Robert'. "We concocted the character together, me and Julie," says the first-time actor. "She wanted him to be true to the time and period, so we made him a west coast, Neal Cassady type." Salma Hayek (Taymor’s friend and star of Frida), plays the sexy dancing nurses in "Happiness is a Warm Gun". Taymor asked Hayek if she wanted to play a nurse and Hayek said she wanted to play all five of them, something that was accomplished with motion control camera work (requiring Hayek to repeat her dance number very carefully many times during two long days in order to create the illusion of five pin-up nurses). Eddie Izzard plays the role of the circus ringleader in "Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" and Joe Cocker worked in the middle of several nights to complete his multiple "Come Together" roles of singing bum, pimp, and hippie. To interpret the music, Taymor relied upon a trusted longtime collaborator, Elliot Goldenthal. "Though Elliot is a composer and there are no songs to be composed, his arrangements and his understanding of drama and character are so great. I’ve worked with him for twenty years and have total trust and admiration for his work. I knew that he would find a new way to interpret the songs; by placing them with new arrangements, the music would be fresh again; not a better version, but different." "Everybody knows the Beatles’ music so well, it’s almost like a ghost in the room. All the licks that they played, the specific guitar fills, the drum fills; everybody fills those in when they hear the songs. The songs were done perfectly already by the Beatles, they are definitive performances. So the challenge was try to find an honest way," says Goldenthal, "staying within oneself of getting to the core of these songs and try to find other ways to support the beautiful words and music." All songs in the film were performed live on set. To achieve this, the actors were all fitted with tiny ear pieces, called 'earwigs', to enable them to sing along with their pre-recorded performance. Most of "Across the Universe" was shot on practical locations using over fifty locations in sixty days, mostly in the New York City area. Coordinating this complicated shoot was First Assistant Director Geoff Hansen, who says, "Julie is one of the most creative, artistic directors I’ve ever worked with in my life. She’s got a vision that blows me away." Location manager Rob Striem notes that "On a lot of films you have a few locations where you can settle in and get comfortable. On this film, every single set was one, two or three days at most, so we were constantly jumping around." Synopsis

Jude is a young man working on the docks in Liverpool. He is the product of an affair his mother had with an American during the war. Jude decides to leave home and travel to the U.S.A and track down his father who works at Princeton. But meeting his father doesn't change much. By chance he meets Max. The two decide to head for New York. Eventually, Max's sister Lucy joins them. Jude and Lucy become lovers. The star-crossed lovers, along with a small group of friends and musicians, are soon swept up into the emerging anti Vietnam war and counterculture movements, with 'Dr Robert' and 'Mr Kite' as their guides. Lucy joins a group of ant-war protesters, who, unbeknowns to her have a hidden agenda. In these tumultuous times, forces outside their control, ultimately tear the young lovers apart, forcing Jude and Lucy, against all odds, to find their own way back to each other.

The Verdict "You don't have to be a Beatles expert or even a fan of the 'Fab Four' to enjoy this remarkable production, "Across The Universe". After all, who, over the past four or so decades hasn't heard a Beatles song? Not too many I suspect. The songs are not covers of Beatles standards and that's what really adds the magic, the zing and the zest to this tale of star crossed lovers Jude and Lucy. What makes these arrangements by composing legend and Golden Globe winner Elliot Goldenthal all the more exciting, is that they were performed live on set or on location. There's no lipsyncing here. There's a lesson for all of us in "Across The Universe" which is set against a background of the 'hippie', Martin Luther King and the Vietnam War protest era. 'Baby Boomers' will get a big kick out of revisting this defining time in the world's history. For everyone else, it's just a matter of falling in love with the sights, sounds and performance of what is a very entertaining film. And look out for the Universal Music soundtrack CD which features 16 tracks from the film. Highly recommended. 4 STARS." Cast & Crew Bytes "ACROSS THE UNIVERSE" stars .......
Jim Sturgess ["The Browning Version", "Mouth To Mouth" and "v"]; Joe Anderson ["Little Box of Sweets", "Becoming Jane" and "Control"]; Dana Fuchs ["Across the Universe"]; Martin Luther McCoy ["Dave Chappelle's Block Party"]; T.V. Carpio ["She Hate Me"]; Two Time EMMY Award winner Eddie Izzard ["The Cat's Meow", "Five Children and It" and "Ocean's Thirteen"]; Golden Eagle Best Actress Award winner Salma Hayek ["Frida", "Once Upon a Time in Mexico", "After The Sunset" and "Lonely Hearts"] and 2007 Cannes Film Festival Chopard Trophy winner Evan Rachel Wood ["S1m0ne", "The Missing" and "The Upside of Anger"] as Lucy.
"ACROSS THE UNIVERSE" was .......
directed by Emmy Award winner Julie Taymor ["Titus" and "Frida"]; screenplay by BAFTA Film Award winner Dick Clement ["The Commitments", "Goal!" and "Flushed Away"] and Peter Sellers Award winner Ian La Frenais O.B.E ["The Commitments", "Excess Baggage" and "Goal!"]; Art Directors Guild Award winner art direction by Peter Rogness ["The Shipping News", "Catch Me If You Can" and "The Producers"]; set decoration by Ellen Christiansen ["You've Got Mail", "Far From Heaven", "Hitch" and "The Producers"]; costume design by Two Time Oscar winner Albert Wolsky ["All That Jazz", "Bugsy", "The Pelican Brief" and "Runaway Bride"]; production design by Mark Friedberg ["Runaway Bride", "Far From Heaven" and "The Producers"]; edited by Academy Award winner Françoise Bonnot A.C.E ["Z", "Year Of The Dragon" and "Frida"]; cinematography by César Award winner Bruno Delbonnel A.S.C ["The Cat's Meow" and "A Very Long Engagement"]; original music by Academy Award & Six Time ASCAP Award winner Elliot Goldenthal ["Michael Collins", "Frida" and "S.W.A.T"]. Who's Who?

Evan Rachel Wood Jim Sturgess Joe Anderson Dana Fuchs Martin Luther McCoy T.V. Carpio Spencer Liff Lisa Hogg Nicholas Lumley Michael Ryan Angela Mounsey Robert Clohessy Eddie Izzard Salma Hayek

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Lucy Jude Max Carrigan Sadie JoJo Prudence Daniel Jude's Liverpool Girlfriend Cyril Phil Jude's Mother Martha Jude's American Father Mr Kite Singing Nurse

Run Time 133 minutes Rated M [AUST] Copyright ©2007 - Sony Pictures - All Rights Reserved ©2007 All Rights Reserved - The Movie Pages & Impact Internet Services - Protected by Australian & International Copyright. Trademark Laws Apply.