Friday, September 29, 2006; WE36

"The U.S. vs. John Lennon" opens in 1971, when Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, appeared at a fundraising concert for John Sinclair, best known to most music fans as the radical impresario behind the Detroit punk band the MC5. That appearance succeeded in getting Sinclair -- who was serving a 10-year sentence for handing undercover narcotics agents two marijuana joints -- released from jail. But it also brought Lennon straight into the cross hairs of Richard Nixon, J. Edgar Hoover and, eventually, their minions at the Immigration and Naturalization Service who for nearly three years tried to have Lennon deported.

David Leaf and John Scheinfeld's revelatory documentary deftly sets the stage for Lennon's odyssey through the dark mirror of U.S. political life, looking back to 1966 when the singer-songwriter suggested that the Beatles had become more popular than Jesus in Britain -- a comment that quickly traveled 'round the world to become one of the most misquoted and misunderstood observations of an increasingly contentious era.

It's chilling to hear FBI agents reminisce about pursuing Lennon, and readers tempted to write off that episode as yet another paranoid fantasy of The Left should take heed: "The U.S. vs. John Lennon" includes the firsthand testimony of the spies themselves, from apostate FBI agents to the unapologetic G. Gordon Liddy. It's all there on the record for the benefit of those who care enough about history not to repeat it. And at a time when the country is engaged in fresh debates about the fragile relationship between privacy and national security, this particular chapter seems worth revisiting.

-- Ann Hornaday

The U.S. vs. John Lennon PG-13, 99 minutes Contains some strong profanity, violent images and drug references. Area theaters.