Nowhere Boy (2009) - Fall for Johnson, with Taylor-Wood

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Aaron Johnson's awfully pretty face under a cloud on this poster for Sam Taylor-Wood's Nowhere Boy

John Lennon grows up to become a rebel; the germ of it being his uncertainty of his parentage, which is enlightened when he rediscovers his mother, right around the same time that he forms his own pop-rock band.

 

Nowhere Boy is written by Matt Greenhalgh (Control (2007)), based on Lennon's half-sister Julia Baird's memoir Imagine This - Growing Up with My Brother John Lennon (2007), and directed by debuting Sam Taylor-Wood (Misfit (1996, short)).

Aaron Johnson (Shanghai Knights (2003)) as Lennon at first has his enthralling good looks against himself; he is simply too good-looking for his own good. But he is still fascinating, vivacious and dedicated here in a part he obviously enjoys taking on, which coincides with his becoming the real-life partner of his 23 years older director here, (the two married in 2021 and changed names to Sam Taylor-Johnson and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.) Johnson gets splendid support here from a glorious Kristin Scott Thomas (Agent Trouble (1987)), Thomas Brodie-Sangster (Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials (2015)) as Paul McCartney and Anne-Marie Duff (On Chesil Beach (2017)) as his mother.

It is impossible (for me at least) to see the Lennon I have seen, - the limp, drowsy Beatle hippie, - in the virile, dominant Johnson, and a hardcore Beatle-fan may protest this fact. But taken as it is, this is a fine and well-acted, delicate film of Lennon's youth, ultimately moving.

 

Watch  a trailer for the movie here

 

Cost: 1.2 mil. £, approximately 1.6 mil. $

Box office: 6.5 mil. $

= Big hit (returned 4.06 times its cost)

[Nowhere Boy premiered 29 October (London) and runs 97 minutes. Shooting took place in March 2009 - ? in England, including in London. It opened #45 to a 52k $ first weekend in 4 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #23 and in 215 theaters, grossing 1.4 mil. $ (21.5 % of the total gross). The film's biggest market was the UK with 1.5 mil. $ (23.1 %). North America was 2nd biggest, and Australia 3rd biggest with 807k $ (12.4 %). The film was nominated for 4 BAFTAs and won 1/6 British Independent Film awards. among other honors. Taylor-Wood returned with two music videos and a short before her theatrical return with Fifty Shades of Grey (2015). Johnson returned in Kick-Ass (2010); Scott Thomas in Love Crime (2010); and Duff in Margot (2009, TV movie) and theatrically in Sanctuary (2012). Nowhere Boy is certified fresh at 80 % with a 6.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Nowhere Boy?