Change Your Image
madli-5-94345
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Lords of Chaos (2018)
Escalation of Evil
Former Bathory drummer Jonas Åkerlund mostly is known for his impressive music videos. "Smack My Bitch Up" or "Turn The Page" are just two examples of his countless successes. But also especially his first movie "Spun" gained benevolently critics. With his thriller "Horseman" he could win Dennis Quaid as main actor, "Small Apartments" is an outstanding comedy and on Netflix recently "Polar" premiered. But if he did himself a favour with this one is questionable.
The story of the early Norwegian Black Metal and the bands Mayhem, Burzum, Emperor and Darkthrone is widely known not only in the scene itself. A singer that shot himself and his band colleagues use a picture of his corpse as a cover and pieces of his skull as necklaces. A series of curch burnings and the killing of a gay man. Plus the summit of the power struggle of two protagonists ending in the brutal stabbing of Euronymous, who was founder of Mayhem and is the main character in Lords Of Chaos.
Slam Alternative Music Magazine presents the movie at the Filmcasino. That it was produced at Vice Studios let the first ones in the audience murmur. During scenes like the brutal suicide of Dead people even leave the room. Jack Kilmer does a great job as do Rory Culkin as Euronymous and Emory Cohen as Varg Vikernes. Their characters appear convincing, and Åkerlund manages that the actions act conclusively.
The start of the band and their way of living are told quickly in the beginning. But the longer the story goes on, the more the music itself gets the minor matter. Key locations are the cottage where Mayhem lived and the record store Helvete (nowadays Neseblod Records). Apart from all the violence, the script leaves space for some jokes, e.g. about Death Metal. For actions like the lighting of a cigarette Åkerlund uses his typical fast editing, but for the crimes he takes his time.
And so the film ends with Varg, who is no longer the shy boy from the beginning, brutally stabbing Euronymous. His off-voice that leads through the movie relativizes his own death by saying he created Black Metal and Mayhem. Lords Of Chaos is no documentary even though Åkerlund used some nice archive material, but a great entertainment film "based on truth, lies and what actually happened".
Hevi reissu (2018)
Great Fun Ideas and Headbanger Sound
A band that exhumes their dead drummer, kidnaps a patient of a psychiatric clinic and nearly starts a war. Maybe the best description for the crazy journey of one band from the northern Scandinavian countryside.
Since the legendary "This Is Spinal Tap" from 1984, that the filmmakers of this movie also quote as an influence, the last years have been good for Hard Rock cinematic art. Alone in 2013 even three hit the screens: the short film "Necronomica", the comedy "Pop Redemption" (german title "Happy Metal - All We Need Is Love!") and epic "Málmhaus" (german "Metalhead"). Together with Stormbringer, the Filmcasino took the responsibility and presents the latest Metal comedy "Heavy Trip".
This amazing piece is brought to you by Finnish production company Making Movies Oy. Finland is also where the story begins, in the village Taivalkoski. The basic story follows four outsiders who play in a band, never played a gig or wrote a song but by accident see the opportunity to play a festival abroad in Norway. The dream of being successful with the own Rock is a real one for many, and documentaries like "The Story of Anvil" brought it to a bigger audience.
For their gig at the festival, the band around main character Turo finally finds a name - Impaled Rektum, and writes the very first song "Flooding Secretions" after an incident at the clinic where Turo works. But the gig is based on a lie, and as drummer Jynkky dies, they've reached the bottom. Also the movie itself fights few weaknesses, but the grandiose humor and jokes help to get over them. The absurd border scene that nearly leads to the war makes a bit think of "Iron Sky". Close to the end, the band gets help from Vikings from a LARP. And all over the film, you can find sweet little jokes of the Metal scene like when Journi says about getting the girl "The Chase is better than the catch" or Lotvonen's dad waves goodbye with his ring- and middle finger missing.
And then you even get the lovely small Finnish details, the swearwords from "Vittu" to "Perkele", the beautiful old Finnish women's bike Turo rides and the guksi he drinks off when practising. With all of this and the affecting ending, not only for Metal lovers, Heavy Trip is big fun.