So let’s say there’s a new restaurant in town that is supposedly really really good. Everyone you know has eaten there. It’s been open for a month now, and everyone absolutely loved it. They can’t stop talking about how great it is and how much you would like it, because it’s Italian, and Italian food is your favorite. So after a month, you’re kind of sick and tired of hearing about it and you don’t really want to go anymore, but you feel obligated to because everyone you know associates you with this place, so you absolutely have to have an opinion about it. So you finally decide to go try it one night and you find out it’s not that good. The bread is good, so is the salad, but the actual pasta is terrible. Well, that’s how I feel about “Across The Universe.”

Everyone I know kept asking if I’d seen this movie cause I love the Beatles and I also love musicals. Then, I found out it had a multitude of mixed reviews and it made me really hesitant. I thought I’d wait for the DVD. But after the upteenth “You haven’t seen it yet? It’s sooooo good, you would like it!” I decided it was time.

And boy was everyone WRONG!! If I had to describe this movie with one word, “cliche” hits the jackpot. Cliche are the characters in the movie. Cliche is every thing that happens in the film. Cliche is the way each Beatles song is used. They should’ve called it “One Big Cliche.”

Jude, the protagonist, is a young factory worker from Liverpool who leaves home for the U.S. in search of his father. Throughout his time there, he befriends several characters which include a Janis Joplin-like landlord named Sadie, a Jimi Hendrix-esque blues guitarist named JoJo, an Asian lesbian called Prudence, Max a college student and Max’s sister Lucy, the love of his life. They all come from different places, obviously, and end up living in a New York apartment together. All of this while the movie tackles heavy issues like the Vietnam War and the Detroit riots. The characters use over 30 Beatles songs to carry the story along. But rather than using them in a metaphorical sense, the director makes sure every lyric fits every scene, literally.

The topics addressed in the film are a lot to handle for a musical, so we get these really campy one-dimensional characters. The struggling singer, the activist and the struggling artist. At times I felt like I was watching “Rent.” And even if the characters’ singing is beautifully done, the movie felt like a bunch of bad music videos pieced together with a story that seems to go nowhere. It was just kind of embarrassing at times and much less epic than you’d think a Beatles-inspired movie would be. Don’t get me wrong, it was visually stunning (as you can see in the photos) and the music is obviously the best part of the film, but as far as plot goes, it falls flat on its face.

So the following is a list of things this movie could’ve done without.

1) The unbearable amount of 60s stereotypes. Yes, I get it, it was an important time for America. Riots, protests, race relations, I’ve seen it in every other movie about this subject. Why must you remind me and use Beatles tunes to do it in the campiest way possible?

2) Characters named after Beatles songs with stories that I couldn’t care less about. First we see Prudence sing a beautiful rendition of “I Want To Hold Your Hand” as she daydreams about her cheerleader crush. She joins the group while escaping an abusive ex-boyfriend. Then what? Nothing happens! She hides in a closet and adds “Dear Prudence” to the movie’s soundtrack.

3) The overly pretentious art-student imagery. Asian women with body paint jumping into a lake? Strawberries exploding in a godawful montage of the Vietnam war? Come on. That’s just hokey! It was embarrassing! It was like a student film project with a million-dollar budget.

Overall, I didn’t want to hate it. I wanted to love it like I loved Moulin Rouge (and yes, many may argue that movie was crap, but at least it was original!) This was just a big mess with no pay-off except for a few good Beatles covers. You’re better off downloading the soundtrack.