Artist-turned-filmmaker Sam Taylor-Wood’s debut drama take us back to when Lennon, who wrote the Beatle’s hit song « Nowhere Man » was a « nowhere boy ». Lennon was abandoned by his mother and raised by his aunt and uncle. He was almost fifteen before he learned that his mother lived just across a park from him. It is a dramatic time in Lennon’s life, a time when he also met Paul McCartney and the other Beatles, and began making music.
In portraying it, Taylor-Wood brings Liverpool in the 1950’s to vivid life. Aaron Johnson, familiar to movie fans from Kick-Ass, is excellent as the young Lennon. He captures perfectly the intense young man’s growing intelligence and determination to suceed - not to mention his cool Elvis Presley hairstyle !