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Film / The Killing of John Lennon

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"I was nobody until I killed the biggest somebody on Earth."

The Killing of John Lennon was a 2006 movie dramatizing the events leading up to Mark David Chapman's killing of John Lennon.


This film contains examples of:

  • Gunman with Three Names: Averted. The real Chapman is often called "Mark David Chapman", but in this film, his three names aren't used until the very end, to emphasize the fact that he was a complete nobody until he killed John Lennon.
  • Hate Sink: In reality, Mark David Chapman is universally despised by John Lennon’s fans for what he did. As a result, along with concerns over her safety, Yoko Ono has seen to it that he never gets parole.
  • Heteronormative Crusader: While staying at the YMCA, Chapman flips out because two men are having sex in the room next to his, and contemplates going next door and killing them. He stops himself only because killing two men would probably ruin his plans to kill Lennon.
  • Madness Mantra: Chapman repeats the phrase, "The phony must die, said the Catcher in the Rye," several times in the movie.
  • No Social Skills: The film portrays Chapman as a loner who really doesn't fit in anywhere. The few times he's actually seen interacting with other people before the killing, he is abrasive or aloof towards them. It's worth noting that the film is shown from the perspective of Chapman after he's become obsessed with Catcher in the Rye, so he may just have convinced himself that he has no social skills.
  • Platonic Prostitution: Before killing Lennon, Chapman hires a prostitute to recreate a scene from The Catcher in the Rye where Caulfield hires a prostitute. Chapman has no intention of having sex with the prostitute.
  • Unreliable Narrator: The film is narrated from Mark David Chapman's perspective, and is based upon the real Chapman's own account of the events leading up to the killing. Thus, it's questionable how much of the story is true.
  • Villain Protagonist: The main character is the guy who killed John Lennon, and as the film makes clear, he had no good justification for it.


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