“Nowhere Boy”: not lovable, but definitely all Lennon

The subtle beauty of “Nowhere Boy” has to do with how it works on so many levels at once. Are you a Beatles or a Stones fan? Who was your favourite Beatle, John or Paul? Do you think John was a tortured genius with a troubled childhood, or a whinging Scouse git, rude, obnoxious and excruciatingly self-centred?

Sam Taylor Wood’s debut feature reveals the love triangle between the young Lennon, his ultra-starched Aunt Mimi, who raised him, and his estranged mother. Mimi’s house and disposition are reflections of her middle-class aspirations, perfect, well mannered and erudite, “No John, we do not turn Tchaikovsky over.” Kristen Scott Thomas plays her with an old Imperial stoicism that masks her deep affection for her precocious nephew and her softer husband George.

Unexpectedly, George dies from a heart attack, paving the way for John’s mother Julia to re-enter his life. If Mimi’s relationship with her nephew is emotionally stunted, then Julia’s approach to her prodigal son is at best inappropriate and at worst almost incestuous. Anne Marie Duff has her Julia swoon over John like a lovesick teenager. This happens at the expense of her daughters from her common-law husband, Bobby. “You’re my dream,” she beams, giddy with infatuation.

To her credit, Taylor-Wood never tries to upstage her subject matter (unlike Lennon himself), but neither does she pander to his demigod status. The result is a visually restrained affair, which is surprising, considering Taylor-Wood’s stature as an artist in her own right. An incredible time-lapse sequence does hint at her genius as a filmmaker. It shows John mastering the banjo in Julia’s cluttered house, oblivious to the world revolving around him. Again, this sequence begs the question: is he single-minded or simply selfish?

Challenging John’s supreme arrogance is the super confidence of the young Paul McCartney, played as a laddish dandy by Thomas Brodie Sangster. McCartney’s professionalism harnesses John’s rough poetry and gives it the direction it needs. The real star of “Nowhere Boy” is, appropriately Aaron Johnson in his dynamite turn as Lennon. Just watch the intensity on his face as he records his first track, “In Spite Of All The Danger,” the raw emotion channelled through the microphone into every McCartney penned lyric.

Taylor-Wood’s movie can be neatly summed up by the man himself: “I wasn’t lovable, I was always Lennon.” Well, we all secretly preferred George Harrison to Lennon or McCartney anyway. Based on this film, one suspects that Taylor-Wood’s next project will be the one to fully revel her cinematic talent, as long as it’s free from the albatross of John Winston Lennon.