The film is based on an interview of John Lennon by Jerry Levitan in 1969. Levitan, then 14 years old, tracked Lennon to his hotel room at Toronto's King Edward Hotel after hearing a rumour that Lennon had been sighted at the Toronto Airport. Jerry made his way into John Lennon's suite and persuaded John to agree to an interview. The animation is based on Levitan's historic 30 minute recording of the interview, which was edited down to 5 minutes.
It must be an animator’s dream to be able to put images to the words of John Lennon as he gives an interview to a fourteen year old lad. Using the taped audio from this chat, we hear the views of Lennon on all things from world peace, war, government, music and drugs - just about everything that was of interest to him and to his young questioner. As you’ll expect, the responses to only really three or four questions are fluid and rambling, but they are also quite profound as they offer him advice on being himself, not conforming and not just going with the flow. Meantime, the pen and computer generated artistry keeps up perfectly illustrating, exaggerating and accentuating his points in an entertaining, almost Monty Python, style that shows effortlessly the connections between all aspects of human life, behaviour and thought. It all sounds like it was an honest piece of ad hoc conversation that is both honest and fun to listen to and the illustrations work well.