The U.S. Vs. John Lennon

I recently watched the 2006 documentary “The U.S. Vs. John Lennon“, which is a film that details Lennon’s political leanings and his fight to stay in the United States and avoid deportation in the mid 1970′s.  The documentary contains a mixture of archive film footage and current interviews with the principle players, abet Lennon himself for obvious reasons, and succeeds in capturing the extremely volatile political climate of the early 1970’s and the slow demise of 60’s youth culture.

Lennon’s journey from Beatle to political activist is explored in some detail, and although I had a basic knowledge of what to expect in this film, there was a lot of footage that was new to me, and I was a very surprised by how it painted Lennon in the light that he was somehow manipulated into his political views.  I’m not sure how accurate the manipulation factor was, as Lennon seemed to know his own mind and was not easily swayed by outside influences, but it does make you think.  A naive, arrogant rock star with his heart in the right place, could have been easy pickings for the rabid political radicals of the 1970‘s.  But ultimately Lennon’s politics were grown out of the basic philosophy of the 60‘s, namely Peace and Love, and this is one of the central themes of the film.

In a world where death, war and greed are big business, anyone speaking out against the status quo is ultimately viewed as a ‘nut’ by the general public, or a possible enemy of the state by those in power.  This was to be Lennon’s fate.

Throughout the 1970′s Lennon was hounded by the Nixon Government, and was almost deported on numerous occasions.  It has only been through recent freedom of information requests  was it confirmed that Lennon was in fact targeted by the Government,  and was frequently followed by Government agents, and had his phone tapped.

Surprisingly, all of these events culminated with Lennon being granted a green card in 1975, and taking up residence in the United States.  Once granted the right to live in the United States Lennon then promptly dropped out of public life and gave up recording and politics.

During this period, one of the worlds biggest Rock Stars and political campaigners, simply stayed at home and raised his son.  Not a musical or political peep was heard from the ex-beatle.

Five years later Lennon reentered public life with the release of a new record, and  plans for a world tour with political leanings.  He was then murdered.

Although this film does not out rightly  say that Lennon’s death was related to his obvious political power at that time, it did end up reinforcing my own view that Lennon was in fact “taken out”.

Whenever the ‘lone nut’ scenario is presented in the press, it is almost always false. Yes, Mark David Chapman did murder John Lennon, but this film adds fuel to the fire that there was a lot more to it than that…

Interesting film, worth a watch…