John Lennon: soon a documentary on his assassination

Check out the trailer for the three-part documentary series “ John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial “.

Many documentaries about the Beatles have been made in recent years: Eight Days a Weekon Beatlemania, a tribute to the faithful secretary of the Fab Four, Good Ol’ Fredathe poignant Living in the Material World on George Harrison, by Martin Scorsese, and finally the latest (but certainly not least) Beatles documentary, the recent eight-hour opus Get Back by Peter Jackson, which retraces the recording of the group’s latest album, Let It Be. Today, a new documentary is released that examines the aftermath of John Lennon’s assassination by Mark David Chapman in 1980.

Narrated by Kiefer Sutherland and premiering December 6 on Apple TV+, the three-part documentary series titled John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial presents new information, as well as the first filmed interviews with a number of people involved in the tragedy, including Richard Peterson, taxi driver and witness to the shooting, the Dakota janitor who desperately tried to save the life of Lennon and Dr. Naomi Goldstein, the first psychiatrist to evaluate Chapman.

“ Crucially, and unusually in a case of this magnitude, Lennon’s killer was never brought to trial. As a result, a multitude of arguments and detailed evidence regarding Mark David Chapman’s mental state and culpability have never been heard publiclyexplain co-director Rob Coldstream and producer Louis Lee Ray to WECB. This series presents previously unpublished evidence from the prosecution and defense for the first time, using documents and first-hand testimony from those who were present. We have been careful to maintain an even-handed approach throughout the series, simply presenting to the viewer the arguments that were never heard in court. »

Coldstream and Lee Ray add that they have made a particular effort “to not to sensationalize the story » out of respect for Lennon’s surviving family, including Yoko Ono, Sean Lennon and Julian Lennon.

“ Additionally, we approached Lennon’s tragic murder not as an isolated event, but in the context of 1980s America, and we explored the repercussions of the assassination on society at large, they add. What was striking was the number of parallels drawn between 1980 and today, whether on issues relating to mental health, the justice system or gun control. » Watch the trailer for John Lennon: Murder Without a Trial here :