约翰·列侬传

DVD Review If you consider yourself a fan of John Lennon, steer clear of this ugly and disrespectful hodgepodge. A collection of news footage, even if only remotely related to Lennon, his widow Yoko Ono and The Beatles, John Lennon: The Messenger opens with reports of Lennon's murder, shots of grieving fans, interviews with "outer circle" friends (whose close friends would participate with news cameras in the wake of a cold-blooded assassination?)—including his pharmacist—and goes downhill from there. The perpetrator of this heinous crime appears in vintage footage from an interview with Barbara Walters. (Walters is never shown; I would have preferred the murderer had not been, either.) Further news/interview footage of Lennon and Ono, including some from their famous bedside press conference, as well as a brief bit of The Beatles in India that we've seen in better vehicles is layered with excerpts from various audio interviews (some of this audio is extended on the bonus CD). One studio engineer who worked with Lennon in later years cashes in on his rub with fame; his sorrow seems to be that he didn't save all the lyrics written on slips of paper the musician left around the studio. If you must have rare newsreels of the boys, it is here, but mostly inaudible, especially several minutes with Ringo and Brian Epstein. Rock Hudson, Jack Benny, Edward G. Robinson and Groucho Marx are captured upon their arrival at the Hollywood Bowl to see The Beatles. The remainder is speculative opinion with other peripheral characters telling tales out of school. Oh, and some copycat band called The Overtures reconstructs a song they think Lennon might/would have written, and fill in a bit of the soundtrack with other Beatles-style songs. There is very little substance here, and while various related bits are cut together, there seems no rhyme or reason to the order in which these themes are presented. Overall, this reads like the National Enquirer, and may be interesting to those who "want to know." And the title? Don't even get me started... Bad taste from beginning to end. For the real goods, spend some time with the copious talking heads included in Miramax's A Hard Day's Night release or better yet, the two excellent documentaries included in MPI's The Beatles: DVD Collector's Set.