Thanks to successes like Glee and the Broadway production of Green Day’s American Idiot, the musical has made a big comeback in the public consciousness over the past year or so. Across the Universe, however, was ever so slightly ahead of its time; after a tumultuous production and release, the 2007 film flopped at the box office. It’s since attained the first blush of a cult following, and deservedly so: A dazzlingly imaginative yet faithful-in-tone fictionalization of the Beatles’ songbook, the movie stars everyone from Bono to Eddie Izzard to Joe Cocker — one of the Beatles’ greatest interpreters — singing Fab Four classics. In addition to the bursting-at-the-screen sound and cinematography, Across the Universe has another, often overlooked selling point: It contains 100 percent less disco than 1978’s big-screen Beatles musical, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. The Denver Film Society presents Film on the Rocks: Across the Universe tonight at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, 18300 West Alameda Parkway in Morrison. A pre-movie concert by local pop-rock outfit Something Underground, which will be performing its All-Star Beatles Revue in honor of the film, begins around 6:30 p.m., and the movie starts at dusk. Admission is $10; $25 gets you into the Patron Party, which includes food, drinks and VIP seating. For tickets and info, call 303-595-3456 or visit www.denverfilm.org.
Wed., Aug. 11, 7 p.m., 2010