In 1969 Jerry Levitan, a 14 year old Beatles fan at the time, snuck into the hotel where John Lennon was staying in Toronto and talked him into doing an audio interview about peace. 38 years later Jerry’s son Josh Raskin directed the wonderful animated short “I Met The Walrus”, which he created using the the audio from the interview as the soundtrack. The film features pen illustration by James Braithwaite and digital illustration by Alex Kurina.
via Neatorama
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{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Love listening to John Lennon expound on anything. Brings me back to my childhood where the Beatles, especially John and Paul, were omnipresent. Somewhere JL just IS, and he's smiling.
Peace.
-Chris
“violence begets violence”
That is simply amazing! Thanks for sharing this.
If I was fourteen, and snuck into John Lennon's hotel, I doubt I would have put a coherent sentence together. Very creative animation also!
What a great share! Amazing how 38 years later, John Lennon speaks to our current political/military-industrial climate. He must be hanging out with Tupac. Because it feels like he knows what's going on now.
Pity we lost him. Seems like the ones we need get bumped off or die early.
…and we end up with the likes of Strom Thurmond & Jesse Helms way too long.
Great piece of animation, thanks!
Actually, it's Jerry's son Josh who made the film.
The film's description reads “Jerry has produced a film about it.”, so I think it's easy to understand how people would interpret that as Jerry making the film. The other credits are listed as well. I'll update the post.
another couple of artists to add to my list of favorites (already of course including john) ! thank you!
Brilliant vid!
It reminds me of how powerful the principle of non-resistance is when demonstrated in Aikido.
In a typical example, someone grabs your wrist and starts pushing it towards you and you resist using your strength.
In doing so, you are actually creating and perpetuating a condition of struggle.
If you were to suddenly stop resisting, simply allowing your “attacker” to push your arm, you will immediately experience the instantaneous cessation of any resistance. All sense of struggle vanishes because you stop resisting.
Furthermore, if you move off the “line of attack”, and dynamically blend with its energy, you will find yourself with the upper hand, as you can lead. suddenly put into the privileged position of being be able to effortlessly redirect the attack.
The thing I've always liked about this Aikido example is that it shows that nonresistance does not impy passivity or powerlessness. In fact, it proves quite the opposite!
Great film, I was shocked at the quality of the animation. Here's another new Lennon video, a previously unreleased peace seminar from 1969.