Well, I guess I’m going to have to pipe in because, I’m sorry, but AtU did suck.
I adore the Beatles. And I’ve enjoyed Taymor’s previous films, though I’ve found that the full flights of fancy in the rather remarkable (though not perfect) Titus have been replaced by a certain staid conservatism. In both this and Frida, she plays things too straight too much of the time. Though the more impressive visual moments make an impression, they’re way too few and far between.
As in that other mess Moulin Rouge, the film is often perfectly satisfied in rooting the lyrics in an irritating visual literalism, which makes the song interpretetations range from trite to absurd in their obviousness. “With a Little Help from My Friends”? Hey, let’s have some friends palling around! “Dear Prudence”? Hey, let’s stick her in an actual closet! “Revolution”? Hey, let’s set it in an office of revolutionaries! :rolleyes: It’s so incredibly lazy and uninspired.
And then there are the irritating Beatles meta-memes. Hey, let’s name all our characters after Beatles songs! Sometimes (Jude, Prudence, Lucy) we get the actual songs, though the payoff is zilchola. Sometimes (Maxwell, JoJo, Rita, Sadie) we don’t, which simply makes the conceit distracting and stupid. And let’s not even get into the torturously cutsie references. “She came in through the bathroom window!” :snort:
And then there’s the tiresome laundry list of 60s musical & counter-culture cliches. Janis Joplin stand-in? Check. Jimi Hendrix? Check. Timothy Leary? Check. Why? It’s the 60s. We get it! And let’s not even get into the sensitive artist or the pining lesbian or the fresh-faced suburban-turned-flower child atrocities that actually try to pass as characters. Ugh.
And even when the songs embrace something visually promising, half the time they’re cribbing off of something all-too-familiar already. “Something” is such a beautiful song–did we need a tired Titanicesque montage (ooh! sketching a nude! how bohemian!)? “I’ve Just Seen a Face” in the bowling alley would be more fun if it didn’t remind you of the much better musical moments from The Big Lebowski. And as Jude has his little “Revolution” tizzy, all I could think of is: “I’m sorry I had to fight in the middle of your Black Panther party.” (heck, even the girls look almost identical).
So, with so many uninspired interpretations, we’re left with the quality of the singing to buoy us, and sorry, but that’s a fizzle. Virtually none of the songs are sung particularly well (not even the ones sung by Dana Fuchs, who plays an actual singer!), so even the promise of a good musical based on actual, you know, talent evaporates. Don’t get me wrong–there are some times when “amateur” (non-professional) singing is perfectly appropriate for a mood or a song, but there’s so much of it here that the larger impression is A-for-Effort (but don’t quit your day job). The inevitable use of psychadelic visuals for “I am the Walrus” (groovy man!) aren’t nearly so bad because at least you have an actual singer taking a stab at it.
Now, are there some good moments? In isolated cases, yes. “Strawberry Fields Forever” is handled quite nicely (and at least puts to good use the otherwise monotonous Strawberry=Apple equation). “I Want You/She’s So Heavy” is unexpected and though a bit heavy-handed towards the end, still is a breath of fresh air after so many mishandled songs. And “Happiness is a Warm Gun” is bordering on brilliant–taking the obvious subtexts of that song and turning it into some wonderful visual punning (though it owes more than a little to Dennis Potter’s The Singing Detective).
So there are a handful of well-done interpretations (though none that is as breezy and effortless as “Can’t Buy Me Love” from A Hard Day’s Night made over 40 years ago). But there are no characters to care about, so songs that should have some genuine cathartic release–“Hey Jude”, “All You Need is Love”, “Let It Be”–fall flat because nothing that’s happened in the story has earned the goodwill these songs engender. The Beatles are too good for this movie, and the result is that these songs are used as crutches–hobbling us from one tired plot element to another–with zero emotional investment in anything within the film.
A shame. I really, really wanted to like this movie. But my love for the Beatles and the musical genre in general aren’t enough. It was a real risk to make this movie, but in some ways, not nearly as risky as it needed to be. If it had been the Herman’s Hermits songbook, then that’s another thing. But if you’re going to use the Beatles, you’re setting the bar high and you better bring your A game. And in that sense, the film is an unadulterated failure.