A non fiction film about any phase of John Lennon’s life is the documentarian’s equivalent of a wide open net. His transformation from Teddy Boy Liverpudlian rocker to international pop star, then aggressive peacenik took place during an endlessly photogenic and photographed era and is a gift for any dramatist. Not to mention the gaudily-appropriate soundtrack befitting every emotional crest and valley.
The lead up to Lennon’s run-in with the state department is familiar territory and hits all the emotional high points, gliding from touchstone to touchstone of 60s iconography: there’s Nixon’s ramrod straight stick-up-the-arse amorality, LBJ’s hangdog-reluctant jingoism, long-haired moral righteousness pounded into submission by Daley’s swinging batons and of course that tirelessly time-resistant phenomenon, Beatlemania. The new footage consists of talking heads offering typically polarized takes on why the FBI tried to get the newly solo Beatle out of New York City, a process that dragged on for years. The usual suspects are there — G. Gordon Liddy plays the unambiguously unrepentant commie-hating pinko baiter, gladly offering up evidence of Nixonian paranoia. Yoko Ono, as expected, slips into hyperbolic bombast at times, but is the irreplaceable witness for what is increasingly a sort of cult around the life of Saint John. But it’s Lennon’s appearance on film, achingly familiar, that’s a welcome counterweight to some of his friends’ mush-minded attempts at social contextualization. He’s so cynical, sharp and often just fucking hilarious, that oddly he justifies both his acolytes’ worship and his enemies’ fears. He was a genuine threat to something Nixon, Hunt, Liddy and Dean represented, and unlike the other radicals, his songs had a beat you could dance to.
Opens September 15 at Landmark Sunshine
The lead up to Lennon’s run-in with the state department is familiar territory and hits all the emotional high points, gliding from touchstone to touchstone of 60s iconography: there’s Nixon’s ramrod straight stick-up-the-arse amorality, LBJ’s hangdog-reluctant jingoism, long-haired moral righteousness pounded into submission by Daley’s swinging batons and of course that tirelessly time-resistant phenomenon, Beatlemania. The new footage consists of talking heads offering typically polarized takes on why the FBI tried to get the newly solo Beatle out of New York City, a process that dragged on for years. The usual suspects are there — G. Gordon Liddy plays the unambiguously unrepentant commie-hating pinko baiter, gladly offering up evidence of Nixonian paranoia. Yoko Ono, as expected, slips into hyperbolic bombast at times, but is the irreplaceable witness for what is increasingly a sort of cult around the life of Saint John. But it’s Lennon’s appearance on film, achingly familiar, that’s a welcome counterweight to some of his friends’ mush-minded attempts at social contextualization. He’s so cynical, sharp and often just fucking hilarious, that oddly he justifies both his acolytes’ worship and his enemies’ fears. He was a genuine threat to something Nixon, Hunt, Liddy and Dean represented, and unlike the other radicals, his songs had a beat you could dance to.
Opens September 15 at Landmark Sunshine
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