\n<\/p>\n
Three years ago, Sean Ono Lennon was asked to develop a music video for the 50th anniversary of \u201cHappy Xmas (War Is Over),\u201d the 1971 protest song by his parents, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, which has become a rare type of perennial \u2014 a warmhearted Christmas tune that doubles as an antiwar challenge, telling ordinary citizens that peace can be achieved \u201cif you want it.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Lennon, 48, was not interested in making a simple video. That \u201cfelt unnecessary\u201d for such a well-known track, he said in a recent interview. What intrigued him more was the possibility of expanding the song\u2019s message through a narrative film. After about two years of work, that project became \u201cWar Is Over! Inspired by the Music of John & Yoko,\u201d directed by Dave Mullins, which was nominated for an Academy Award<\/a> for best animated short film.<\/p>\n The 11-minute picture is set in a World War I-like battle zone where two soldiers on opposing sides take part in a secret chess game, communicating their moves via a homing pigeon that dodges bombs over a snowy No Man\u2019s Land. In the story\u2019s climax, both armies are ordered into bloody hand-to-hand combat while the opening lines of John and Yoko\u2019s song ring out: \u201cSo this is Christmas\/And what have you done?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n For Sean Lennon, who in recent years has gradually taken on the responsibility of managing his parents\u2019 artistic legacies \u2014 his mother, 91, has officially retired \u2014 the film is part of a continual process to keep that work relevant for younger generations. He is well aware that even a Beatle\u2019s classic can fade away without tending.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not about mining the past,\u201d Lennon said by phone. \u201cYou\u2019re competing with generations of people who have not grown up with the same culture and art that most people my age and older take for granted. So, for me, it\u2019s very important that the message of peace and love, which may be a trope, are not forgotten.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat I don\u2019t want,\u201d he added, \u201cis for my mother and father\u2019s work to disappear with the sands of time.\u201d<\/p>\n The film was made with the help of some substantial forces. Mullins was a longtime animator at Pixar, and in 2021 he joined Brad Booker, the film\u2019s producer, in a new production company, ElectroLeague<\/a>; \u201cWar Is Over\u201d is its first completed project. The score is by Thomas Newman, the Oscar-nominated composer whose credits include \u201cThe Shawshank Redemption\u201d and \u201cWall-E.\u201d Lennon and Ono are among the executive producers.<\/p>\n Lennon was connected to Mullins through a mutual friend, and in an initial meeting they came up with the basic concept of the war setting, the chess game and the messenger pigeon. Mullins said he wrote the full script immediately afterward. (Lennon and Mullins are credited with the film\u2019s story, and Mullins has sole writing credit.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Lennon had recently gotten to know the director Peter Jackson through \u201cThe Beatles: Get Back<\/a>,\u201d his three-part, nearly eight-hour odyssey about the band\u2019s troubled recording sessions in early 1969, and Lennon asked him for advice on \u201cWar Is Over.\u201d Mullins recalled that at a dinner meeting with Lennon in March 2022, he watched in stunned silence as Lennon texted with Jackson, his phone emitting a little whistle as each message was sent. \u201cMy heart was just beating a mile a minute,\u201d Mullins recalled. \u201cLike, oh my God, Peter Jackson\u2019s got our script!\u201d<\/p>\n Jackson\u2019s visual effects company, Weta FX, handled the animation for \u201cWar Is Over,\u201d though Jackson himself was uninvolved. In an email, he said he only saw the film once it was completed.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m genuinely proud to have played a tiny part in bringing it to life,\u201d Jackson said. \u201cIt\u2019s entertaining and charming \u2014 and celebrates humanity without preaching.\u201d<\/p>\n The film was created with Unreal Engine, a platform that was originally developed for video games by the company behind Fortnite. The animation process involved performance capture \u2014 shooting real actors, whose movements become the raw material for computer animation later.<\/p>\n Extensive work went into crafting the look of the animation, which, despite being computer-generated, has a hand-drawn style, with outlines that can resemble charcoal sketches.<\/p>\n Production on \u201cWar Is Over\u201d began before the Ukraine war broke out, and Hamas attacked Israel just as they were wrapping the project. But Lennon said the goal was always to make the story more universal. \u201cWe tried to abstract the aesthetic of World War I into a sort of parallel dimension that wasn\u2019t that war specifically,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n In the film, the two armies wear insignia with opposing geometric designs: one side\u2019s symbols are rounded, the other\u2019s angular. The battle scenes show soldiers of multiple races and ethnicities, representing all humanity.<\/p>\n \u201cSean was adamant in our first conversation that he didn\u2019t want the movie set in an identifiable war,\u201d Jackson recalled. \u201cHe wanted the message from the song to be the focus, and not muddy it by having British fighting Germans, or Americans fighting Vietnamese.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n That message, and how it was delivered, was key to John Lennon and Yoko Ono\u2019s work. Before \u201cWar Is Over\u201d was a song, it was part of a series of peace protests that the couple enacted in various forms throughout 1969, including \u201cbed-ins.\u201d That December, they posted black-and-white billboards<\/a> in 12 major cities around the world displaying variations of: \u201cWar Is Over! If You Want It \u2014 Happy Christmas From John & Yoko.\u201d<\/p>\n It was, perhaps, an early example of a guerrilla media campaign, using celebrity power to transmit a subversive message. \u201cI think you could argue,\u201d Sean Lennon said, \u201cthat my mom and dad invented memes before that term even existed.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWar Is Over\u201d is the latest Beatle-related project that he has been involved with. He was a point of contact for Jackson on \u201cGet Back\u201d and on the release of \u201cNow and Then<\/a>,\u201d the reworked 1970s John Lennon demo that was released in November as \u201cthe last Beatles song.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n For more than a decade, the Beatles, and each individual member, have been the subject of a series of reissues, repackagings and re-examinations of various kinds \u2014 and it is not over. Last month, it was announced that the director Sam Mendes would make four biopics<\/a>, one for each Beatle, which are expected in 2027.<\/p>\n Lennon, who remains an active musician \u2014 he released his latest album, \u201cAsterisms<\/a>,\u201d last month \u2014 said he viewed \u201cWar Is Over\u201d as the kind of project that allowed him to honor his parents\u2019 legacies, an opportunity his mother provided.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m just grateful that she\u2019s given me the freedom to try to do weird things like this,\u201d Lennon said. \u201cYou know, she\u2019s still the queen of the family.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n