Shot over the course of five consecutive days, 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko (1969) is a thirty minute documentary film made for the BBC. The film only aired once before drifting into obscurity for fifty years. During that fifty year period, 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko was often excerpted for various documentary films. By the time that 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko became readily available again via the internet, most fans of John Lennon had already seen the bulk of the film in other documentaries.
The value of 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko is that it presents its subjects at a crucial moment in their careers. The Beatles were quickly dissolving and the Lennons had already put out four records of their own. Lennon and Ono were, by 1969, totally immersed in their project of combining the message of the Peace Movement with the conceptuality of Fluxus art. John & Yoko were far more committed to their billboard advertising campaign for peace (“War Is Over If You Want It) than they were to the next album by The Beatles.
The fly-on-the-wall style of 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko takes the viewer inside a recording session for Yoko’s “Whisper Piece”; behind the scenes of the Apple offices; and into the bedroom of rock n’ roll’s most famous couple. It’s always interesting to see the artists one admirers at work, but in the instance of 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko, the most interesting part of the documentary is the heated exchange between John, Yoko, and journalist Gloria Emerson.
Emerson takes Lennon and Ono to task for their work to promote peace in their own unorthodox way. She points out the hypocrisy of a rich man like Lennon taking out full page ads for peace and staging bed-ins when he could use his money to exact a real and immediate change. Lennon, for his part, comes across as a frustrated ne’er do well with the exception of one point that he makes. The billboards and ads, as Lennon points out, do reach thousands of people from all walks of life; presaging the mass messaging of the internet age.
Diehard fans of John Lennon will most likely be amused by a scene where John and Yoko watch some footage of The Beatles at the Cavern Club circa 1962. What will most likely infuriate fans of Lennon’s is the use of his cover of “Be-Bop-A-Lula” during a driving montage early in the film. 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko was filmed and released in 1969 yet it uses a recording that wasn’t made until late October, 1974 during Lennon’s Rock n’ Roll sessions. Why this recording was used and what sound from the original film was removed I do not know.
It has been forty-three years since John Lennon was murdered. Lennon’s impact on popular culture and art is immeasurable, as was his political activism. Lennon’s often controversial legacy can never diminish the impact of his work. 24 Hours: The World Of John & Yoko is that rare documentary that reveals its subject warts and all. For that reason I recommend it as a way to commemorate Lennon’s passing.
