It has been a while since a movie actually MOVED me. It would have been easy to cry at this one. Music is my kryptonite and no matter how much I try to think music isn't in my veins, the Beatles try to pull me back in! And so witht his film! Julie Taymor, you are a film genius. I am proud to say that Hollywood, even in the midst of the writers' strike, has a future-and its in its female directors!
I loved the opening to this movie. "Girl" is so minimalistic in its setting - a man and his life set against the backdrop of a lonely beach shore, the place where I myself find solace. Here, the character Jude unfolds his love story with Lucy and his meeting with Maxwell, Sadie, JoJo, and Prudence-among other interesting characters along the way. The turmoil of the '60's is eeringly similar to the anti-Iraqi war sentiment of today. Unfortunately, we have no music to really shuttle us forth to move us to demonstrate for peace as is shown in the film. Perhaps from learning from our history, we the new generation felt that war will happen and there's nothing we can do about it. But as John Lennon said: "War is Over. If you want it."
Simple yet profound in the sense that Jude's initial pacifist views gets his relationship with Lucy into a sketchy (pun intended-he is an artist) turn and soon their lives are twisted during a protest and their lives are suddenly torn across waters. In different parts of the world we are unknown to each other unless we make that connection. Jude and Lucy are lucky to have made that connection, overcoming obstacles of distance and politics. In the end, we realize truly that all of really need is
LOVE!
Poignant observations: T.V. Carpio is fetching in her debut as she opens her first scene as a heartbroken closeted teenager who decides to hitchike and explore the world, in and of itself her own exploration of her own sexuality which reaches its pinnacle when Jude, Lucy, Sadie, and Max try to sing to her while she hides-how appropriately-in a closet. Their song is enough for her to come out and not be afraid any longer....For the rest of the film we must make the assumption that she's made a choice, particularly when they all meet up later after some time where she's joined Dr. Leary's compound/circus. She finally reunites with Sadie's band where she plays the toy piano with JoJo on the rooftop of an apartment building a la Beatles.
Max is another complicated character is as much as we desire to see how much he will change. He is a happy go lucky guy. He doesn't take school seriously with the privileged life he has having an ivy leage education. His father speaks over Thanksgiving dinner in which Jude is invited as points out that it is what you do that makes you who you are, insinuating that Max's lack of doing anything makes him nothing...Max's father asks Jude's opinion, to which he offers that it's that whatever you do you do it well. That could mean making choices and hoping they're the right choices. Once a choice is made, one must learn to live with it. In the case of Max, he tries initially to avoid the draft but is made to fight nevertheless. He serves his country well-enough until he's injured and sent back home. It has matured him but has it changed him?...Using his own experiences of what he's seen, the music changes into a scene of Max and Jude much older in two different bars in different countries as Max sings "Hey Jude"....And in the end we must all "take a sad song and make it better."
Lucy I will have to say reflects my desire to fall in love and the fear that is involved. All my life to think that my love would be where I live only to be snatched away, as in Lucy's case where her fiance is killed in battle. Then here comes Jude. Does she dare fall in love again? "If I Fell" is such a telling song as she sings like she's reciting a monologue and watching Jude cast debris into the sea. How often do we just take a look back at a situation and analyze it constantly before acting...I am not impulsive, but I am not Lucy...for she follows her heart and I do not :(
Sadie is a doppleganger for Janis Joplin. In fact, she is played by an actress who has toured off-broadway portraying Janis as well! The only tie i find between her and I is the search for creative success and need for expression. As for JoJO, the telling moment for me was when he performed "As My Guitar Gently Weeps." In a sense, I find my heart gently weeps each time I find I lose that sense of creativity dying and I need to resurrect it from the dead.
As for Jude, I find I am him in so many ways. I cannot really describe all the reasons here. I'm not good in expressing myself and when it comes to feeling left out or jealous I don't speak things through. Instead I go in an incomprehensible rage similar to when he bursts through Lucy's headquarters that she works for a peace organization as he loudly sings "Revolution."
YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION WELL YOU KNOW WE ALL WANT TO CHANGE THE WORLD.
...BUT WHEN YOU TALK ABOUT DESTRUCTION. DON'T YOU KNOW YOU CAN JUST COUNT ME OUT.
DON'T YOU KNOW IT'S GONNA BE....ALRIGHT.
In these words I try to convince myself that yes, things are gonna be alright...but is that for certain?...
Will my male Lucy and my female Jude "Come Together" in the end of my version of my life?....
Overall, sentimentality aside, this movie is powerful, emotional, visually stimulating, and a feast for the musical ear :)
