As something of a Beatles novice, I was intrigued by the prospect of Borrowed Time: Lennon’s Last Decade. Out of the Fab Four, John Lennon’s life is by far the most interesting: he seemed the most eclectic, he veered furthest from the beaten path when the band broke up, and of course, he died incredibly young.
It makes his post-Beatles years ripe for the picking, something Borrowed Time aims to dissect in considerable detail. It stands as the definitive retelling in a 140-minute documentary such as this – and while there’s plenty of insight to glean, it also feels like long-term fans may not get much new information from it.
The film picks up soon after the Beatles’ unofficial hiatus, with Lennon transitioning into an anti-war figurehead, solo artist, and cultural pioneer. It really throws the uninitiated into the deep end to begin with: diving straight into his plans for a solo world tour, formally leaving the band, and applying for American citizenship. If like me you don’t know much about the intricacies of the Beatles’ history, this can feel disorienting and tough to latch onto, though director Alan G. Parker does flit back and forth to fill in some context when necessary.
Borrowed Time‘s main strength is the sheer quantity of first-hand accounts from its interviewees. There’s plenty of insight here from people who actually knew or encountered Lennon, from the journalist he told about leaving the band to a reporter who previously encountered his killer and harbours immense guilt for having not flagged it to his security. That level of insight is priceless, but it also means that those interviewees who clearly didn’t know Lennon and have learned everything they know from contemporary reports have less to offer. In this regard, Parker could’ve been much more judicious in trimming the fat of his talking heads, making a lengthy film leaner in the process.
It also would’ve been nice to see Parker challenge his interviewees a bit more – either to find out some truly new information, or to push back on some of their claims. There’s one particularly jarring moment when an interviewee drops a racial slur unprovoked with seemingly no pushback, and a few inferences mocking Yoko Ono’s personal beliefs as a feminist. On top of that, it seems like most of the detail here, aside from those eyewitness accounts of Lennon, is pretty well-known among Beatles aficionados.
It begs the question of who Borrowed Time: Lennon’s Last Decade is actually for. Parker has a storied career of making similar rock documentaries, so clearly he wants to target those already in the know. That said, the lethargy with which it dissects Lennon’s final years also makes it seem like it’s trying to spell everything out for newcomers. They might feel left out to dry by some of its skips in chronology and Lennon’s artistic output, while diehards likely have heard it all before.
There’s also a concerningly obvious use of generative AI throughout the film, something that feels particularly tone-deaf in light of the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strikes on this exact debate. The opening credits are clearly AI generated and cheapen your first impression as a result, and there are a few instances where the B-roll is all artificial, too.
For a subject as heavily documented as the Beatles, surely it wouldn’t have been too hard to find some real footage to use? It’s wildly off-putting to see these corners cut so drastically, especially as the Beatles are clearly a subject with a lot of personal reverence to the director.
One thing I do praise Borrowed Time for is its handling of Lennon’s assassination in 1980. The film and its interviewees make a concerted effort not to bring any attention to his killer’s identity, something to be applauded in the age of sensationalist true crime reporting on social media.
The first-hand accounts of how they found out about his death, and even the proximity they had to it, is easily the most interesting and insightful part of the film. It makes you wonder whether this would be better served as a documentary on just his death and final days, because the level of detail in this section is leagues above what comes before.
It makes Borrowed Time: Lennon’s Last Decade a film of two distinct halves. The first is interesting but disorienting for newcomers, with plenty of detail but not enough contextualisation to really set the scene. The second half, however, is a much more human, insightful look into a man’s death and the wide, rippling effects it had on millions of people. No matter how engaging it does get, though, it’s hard to overlook the AI use – something that pulls you out of the experience and will unfortunately stick with you for longer than any of the documentary’s insights.
Borrowed Time, Lennon’s Last Decade releases on DVD, Blu-ray, and digital on June 2, 2025.
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