THE US V JOHN LENNON film review

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THE US V JOHN LENNON

At the height of America's ill-fated Vietnam War, the Nixon administration bunkered down into a mentality that demonstrated that the country had learned little since the dark days of McCarthyism twenty years earlier. Draft-dodging was illegal, protests were suppressed and when an English pop star named John Lennon had the temerity to get involved he became a target for those patrolling the highest corridors of power.

David Leaf's documentary looks at this period in some detail, beginning with Lennon's arrival in the States post-Beatles and his gradual realization that as an unelected public spokesman he had the power to do something about the perceived wrongs that were blighting the so-called land of the free. He immediately got up the noses of the authorities when he campaigned - successfully - for the release of a prisoner on cannabis charges. His subsequent political enlightenment at the hands of the Black Panthers and the anti-Vietnam brigade ensured that his case would land on the desk of Richard Nixon himself.

Nixon's reaction was swift and harsh: to refute Lennon's visa and turf him out of the country. But thanks to a wily lawyer and some typical Liverpudlian determination, Lennon outfoxed and eventually outlasted the 37th President of the United States.

Leaf does a good job of assembling talking heads from the time to explain just how ludicrous the administration's efforts were. Lennon was followed, had his phone tapped, and security agents would turn up at his concerts and write down his apparently inflammatory speeches. The superstar's reaction was to come out fighting and his famous bed protests with Yoko Ono are looked at in some detail.

While much of this information has been in the public eye before, the documentary gives us what should be the final word on the matter. It's arguably a little too comprehensive, as it does become somewhat repetitive, and is likely to find more success as a TV film than a cinematic release. Nevertheless it does portray Lennon as a star who was genuinely concerned about the causes he was involved in, compared to our current climate where pop stars seem keen to jump on the latest bandwagon in order to push sales of their albums.

Paul Hurley