Steven Soderbergh’s AI-Powered John Lennon Documentary Premieres at Cannes

Steven Soderbergh’s John Lennon: The Last Interview premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on Friday, offering an intimate portrait of John Lennon’s state of mind mere hours before his assassination outside his New York City home in December 1980.

Within minutes of the documentary, Lennon’s voice resonates with his declaration:

‘I want to make music until I’m dead and buried, which I hope isn’t for a long time.’

The documentary centers on Lennon’s final radio interview, conducted with Yoko Ono for San Francisco’s KFRC on December 8, 1980, to promote their Double Fantasy album, released the prior month. While Lennon and Ono had granted extensive interviews to outlets like Playboy and Rolling Stone, this was their sole radio appearance, ensuring high-quality audio for Soderbergh’s film.

The interview stretched to two hours and 45 minutes, far exceeding its intended scope. Lennon, in an expansive mood, discussed music, fatherhood, peace, and his infamous 1970s “lost weekend” separated from Ono. He also reflected on his career, tracing a thematic arc from The Beatles’ “The Word” (“the word is love”) to “All You Need Is Love”, “Give Peace a Chance”, and “Imagine”.

While the conversation aligns with themes from other interviews of the era, its immediacy and Lennon’s delivery elevate it. Soderbergh and editor Nancy Main condensed the 165-minute interview into a 97-minute film, though the radio hosts’ questions occasionally distract from the couple’s profound responses.

The documentary’s visuals, however, are notably absent. With no original video footage of the interview, filmmakers relied on creative solutions to accompany Lennon and Ono’s audio. The film’s AI-enhanced approach has sparked both curiosity and debate about the ethical boundaries of technology in documentary filmmaking.