Sean Ono Lennon opens up about the new animated film inspired by his parents' song 'Happy Xmas (War Is Over)'
He co-wrote and produced the film
Sean Ono Lennon joined Simon Mayo on Greatest Hits Radio to chat about his new animated film War Is Over! The short film is inspired by his parents' song 'Happy Xmas (War Is Over)'.
John Lennon and Yoko Ono wrote and recorded the iconic song back in 1971, and now more than 50 years later, the song has been used on the soundtrack of a short film, co-written and produced by Sean.
Working with Peter Jackson
Speaking to Simon, Sean explained how he worked with well-known film director Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings), on the production. "I didn't think necessarily that he (Peter Jackson) would want to help us," Sean admitted.
"But I did think that he would like the script. So I just thought maybe he'd help me... advise us, since he knows a lot about computer graphics and animation.
"And he wound up liking the story enough that he finished the technical side, which is probably the most difficult thing.
"Honestly, the film would absolutely not exist if he hadn't done that. So I'm very thankful to Peter Jackson for having done that and to everyone at Weta. It was a work of love because, you know, there was no budget."
Short film - War Is Over!
Opening up about the short film, he told Simon what is was about: "Well, it's a short film, so it would be easy to give the whole thing away, but essentially, there were two soldiers on opposing sides of a war, that were playing chess together."
He went on to explain: "And basically, I guess it's treason or something to play a game with your enemy, but they're playing a game anyway and at first we thought maybe it should be a dog or something that's sneaking the chess moves back and forth across enemy lines.
"But I actually wanted to make it a pigeon because there are so many pigeons from World War I and II. I was always very touched by that. In fact, I saw a statue of a famous pigeon who did all these life-saving, messaging runs.
"So I thought, well, why don't we make it a pigeon? And that was it, but I don't want to give, obviously, too much away."
12" Zoetrope vinyl 'Merry Xmas (War Is Over)'
Along with releasing the short film, the original recording of 'Merry Xmas (War Is Over)' is available on a special 12" Zoetrope vinyl, with Sean explaining the concept. Speaking about his friend Drew Tetz, Sean said: "He has developed this system that has since become very popular where you use the spin of an LP on the turntable with the frame rate of your phone, your video on your phone, to activate an animated little loop that you can actually see in real time...
"Through your phone on the LP, which is very beautiful and I'm really excited about it because it's bridging analogue animation with digital animation. It's sort of like a meeting of all worlds."
Fans can now watch War Is Over! on YouTube, and buy the limited edition Zoetrope vinyl along with the 7" vinyl version.
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