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This original musical from visionary director Julie Taymor (“Frida,” “Titus”) adapts classic tracks by the Beatles to tell the star-crossed ‘60s-era romance of Liverpool-native Jude (relative newcomer Jim Sturgess) and idealistic American teen Lucy (Evan Rachel Wood).

Big question: Can Taymor’s first movie musical duplicate the massive success of her celebrated Broadway production “The Lion King”?

Skip it: Taymor boldly treads into Baz Luhrmann’s pop-musical territory, but the revolutionary Aussie shouldn’t feel threatened. Although “Across the Universe” boasts some truly incredible visuals and undeniably great songs interpreted in innovative ways, it never achieves more than a tenuous grasp on narrative momentum and coherence. Trying to cram 33 songs and a reductive “greatest hits” approach to ‘60s politics into one movie is a tall order, and it comes at the expense of actual character development. That makes for an exhausting and emotionally vacant two hours and 15 minutes.

Catch it: Many of the film’s production numbers are worth seeing on as large a screen as possible—especially “I’ve Just Seen a Face” and “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” which take place in a bowling alley and on a football field respectively—but they’ll be just as worth checking out as more easily digestible YouTube clips.

Bottom line: There’s something invigorating about a movie that tries for too much, rather than the usual too little, but there’s also a point when enough is enough. More noble failure than flat-out disaster, “Across the Universe” still crosses that line.

Bonus: With a movie this over-stuffed there’s hardly room to mention the cameos from Bono (singing “I Am the Walrus” as the psychedelically-inclined “Dr. Robert”) and Taymor’s “Frida” star Salma Hayek (as not one, but five, different dancing nurses in a veterans’ hospital during “Happiness is a Warm Gun”).

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