sorry it took me forever to pull my act together--went out at dusk yesterday came back at dusk today. it's been a long day or two, so i had to eat, pull my head together, get a shower, and make something warm for myself.
i'll cut everything short and jump right into it--lennonyc obviously. been on that trip since last night, have 'me' limited solo john's on my playlist--all ready to roll about the documentary that i saw (and dragged my two dearests with me as well)over the movie festival here in paradise city.
it was a weird one to watch, it talks about john's last decade or so, from december 71 if i remember it correctly. it's just after the dylan induced 60s have dusted out (at one point Yoko mentions--upon learning that nixon had won yet again the crew puts on a 'dylan record' to diffuse the bluesy mood). historically it was wonderful to see what had actually followed the magical sixties--you kinda jump directly to the end of the vietnam war in general narrations, skipping a few years ahead from closing it up with woodstock in 69 and then picking it up with the end of the war--or to blood on the tracks which was released some time around then. to me 71 is also the year that jim passed away, so it carries a finality in its own, and the spirit dies with him. but in lennonyc you get to see the post-60s era, you see john and yoko settle in to the post-dylan post-beatle scene, yet some of the big guns still linger around--like warhol and ginsberg (oh the angelic ginsberg)--so you form a linear understanding of the whole thing. you see the village moving out of its folk-beat craziness to a failed flower-power then to somewhat of a medium.
but those are obviously a bunch of details that possibly amused me and only me in the whole theater.other than that it's possibly the most yoko-based documentary i've ever seen in my life. it comes to a point where it kind bugs you. now i'll be very honest--you learn of john lennon two ways when you're a kid: 1)he was a former beatle--a super human group 2) he married--let's not sugarcoat it--one wacky looking lady. overtime i personally made peace with her, even though secretly i thought that she was kinda responsible for the whole thing to burn up in flames--but i always thought of her as the other-half of john, and even pitied her a bit for suffering the years and years of abuse that she had suffered, not to mention becoming a blind spot of history for anything that she existed for without john. while the movie does a decent job in breaking the devil-yoko cycle, it feeds off a little too much of her input.
i honestly think it's more about john and yoko than it is about john, or new york, or both. you kinda understand why though--the two were so tightly knitted that i think at some point they didn't have a life seperate of one another. therefore any story you begin to tell about john, you end up talking about yoko. still, you feel like john isn't as vivid as he should be on that screen. you feel like the yoko factor drowns him out a bit.
the music is lightly touched upon. since the songwriter is out of reach, that could also be understandable, but it also affects the john-ness of the whole piece.
but john--john at times comes through. especially his wicked sense of humor, the gentleness in his physical appearance but more so, actually the most, possibly, the humanity in his voice. the softness of his tone while he cracks jokes about him never getting his sashimi unless you tell the place that its for yoko, or the reels of meaningless studio talk--those are what gets to you the most. what got to me the most at least. the death is not talked about in depth (the way it was put on was just flawed). but anytime they would play back any of the studio chattering i got teary (ok a bit more than teary, sue me).
i don't feel through john that often, not the way i do to dylan through his songs. i've always felt a bit more estranged to him than anyone else. i had read some time back julian's account of john's absence and a failed father is a failed person to me--for if you do not love a child than i don't know if you are capable of loving--so i had always thought a bit more downside about john. the documentary talks a lot about sean and John's devotion to him, which outright bothered me. not that i know anything about what happened between anyone in the story, but i felt, i don't know, like the whole thing wasn't sincere.
they talk about one particular night on which john was drunk, and they were trying to shove him into the back of the car, and he was yelling out yoko's name. one guy says that he always cried out for yoko when he was drunk. that is the strongest image that got stuck with me of the whole thing. that is the john i preferred to take with me of last night, and i think that's the john that will stick around with me for a little more.
some time ago i had told a friend that john was troubling to me for "he seemed very selfish and loveless but at the same time beautifully naive about love and peace and the world" and he told me he could have been both, at the same time. that i do not know. but i do know this== "imagine there's no heaven/it's easy if you try/ no hell below us/ above us only sky" are the most courageous beautiful pound-worthy words i've ever heard in my life.
here's my favorite john (the song, that is)--
ps: there was one particular story that i have to tell--back when john and yoko were separated for a little while in the early seventies--yoko walks into a vintage store and sees this silk men's pajamas and she buys them deciding that whomever they fit perfectly will be the one for her. years pass and john strolls back in ny and they get back together and john puts on the pajamas--and bam--perfect match. that's the most poetic soul-mate story i've ever heard in my life.
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