Julian Lennon has admitted that a "weird" scene involving his late father John Lennon in the film "Yesterday" ruined the viewing experience for him.
The 2019 romantic comedy stars Himesh Patel as Jack — a musician who wakes up one day to find that nobody remembers The Beatles and he decides to pass their music off as his own. For the most part, the film was well received and although it did not star any of the original Beatles members, they and their families gave their approval for the go-ahead.
However, fans remain divided on one particular scene in which Jack (Patel) runs into John Lennon (played by Robert Carlyle) at a remote English countryside home. With The Beatles never existing in the film, John Lennon lived into old age away from the limelight. It was this scene that Julian said he found odd during an appearance on comedian Kevin Nealon's YouTube series "Hiking with Kevin."
"I actually loved that film 'Yesterday,' until they put that weird bit of an impression of what Dad would look like in his 70s and 80s or whatever, up on a Scottish or Irish island. It kind of threw the whole film off for me,” Julian Lennon said.
"I didn't get it," he added. "It wasn't necessary for me, I don't think. And it was just weird."
Director Danny Boyle previously spoke about the divisive scene during a 2019 interview, stating that while some audiences loved it, others slammed it as blasphemous.
"When we came to test the film, yes, there are some people that don't like it at all. But other people like it enormously," he told USA Today. "We call it a 'marmite scene' in Britain. It divides people very clearly."
It was inevitable that the film would touch on John Lennon's death though. It was with this in mind that the script "was written from the heart," Boyle said, adding that the team worked to incorporate the scene in an "appropriate way."
"We worked very, very hard to make sure it remained a very pure moment," he added.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.