Are You Kidding Me?

Rating: 1/10 (14 March 2008)

DON'T BE GUILTED, COERCED, OR TRICKED INTO SEEING THIS ONE. If you saw the previews, read a synopsis, or received a recommendation that caused you to think "that could be terrible" - trust your instincts! If you love the music of the Beatles for what it is, not what it has been interpreted, analyzed, inflated, clichéd, and run through the nauseating filter of unoriginal nostalgia to "be" - avoid this movie like a dead animal in the road.
It plays like a Musical-Theater Major's wet-dream. Dramaticized interpretations of over- the-top music numbers, choreography, canned acting, and clichéd plot...oh my!
I really wanted to like this film - I wanted "Across the Universe" to rise above the pitfalls of the musical genre as they managed in "Sweeney Todd." And yet, it not only fell right in...it reinforced every single one.
This movie has no soul - This movie sucks souls. This movie lacks originality. This movie cheapens every single social movement and era that it portrays. To believe that this pays tribute to the times or the Beatles is to lack any true taste, understanding, or respect for what actually was. Just when you thought that nobody could make the Beatles cornier than Paul McCartney has managed to do these days, "Across the Universe" was released.
Excuse me, I need to vomit.