How do you do justice to The Beatles and their extensive catalogue of poetry and lyrical depth (sometimes intertwined with pure pop-sensation) when using their songs as a backdrop for your new musical? Its hard to contain everything within a two hour time frame and with only so many things to explore but Julie Taymor (previously directed Frida) does her best to do so anyways.
Set in the sixties, when music was pure, Vietnam was breaking in and out and when the USA was on the verge of a revolution, we find our main characters (appropriately named after the songs' characters) Lucy (the rich US girl), Jude (the poor UK guy), Max (the brother of said rich US girl) and a bunch of supporting characters (Sadie, JoJo, Prudence,..., who all have their own conflicts).
Lucy wakes up after her boyfriend is killed in the meaningless war, Jude struggles to grasp the artistic self he so badly wants to throw unto a piece of paper, Max gets enlisted in the Army, Sadie & Jojo have relationship problems and Prudence feels like she is alone on the planet.
This is the simplified version and mostly just the general feel of these characters but it works mixed with the songs you'd expect to be in a movie like this and what our actors playing said people. Look out for songs such as Hey Jude, Try With A Little Help From My Friends, Dear Prudence, Revolution, Come Together, All You Need Is Love, I Want To Hold Your Hands, Let It Be, I Want You (She's So Heavy), I Am The Walrus (nice cameo from Bono) and actually many more.
Throw in an artistic style to correspond with the tone of the scene, the emotion and the time it is set in (Uncle Sam wants you was a nice scene), a 90/10 hit/miss ratio and 1001 references to the Beatles itself and you've got yourself a perfect piece of entertainment.
I do not know how a diehard Beatles fan will respond to this (I am a fan of their but not in that way) but I enjoyed it immensely and still got it in my head (after watching it two weeks ago)
9/10.
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