Metal: A Headbanger's Journey sets out to answer the question. Why has metal been consistently stereotyped, dismissed and condemned and yet is loved so passionately by its millions of fans? Filmmakers Sam Dunn, Scot McFadyen, and Jessica Joy Wise travel to the UK, Germany, Norway, Canada and the US to explore the issue. With interviews with Tony Iommi, Bruce Dickinson, Rob Zombie, Alice Cooper, Dee Snider, Geddy Lee, Ronnie James Dio, Lemmy Kilmister, Vince Neil and many more the film makers explore key elements in metal such as sexuality, religion, violence and death including extreme parts of the culture like church burnings in Norway.
I have to say that I am not a die hard fan of metal music. I wouldn't even consider myself a fan. I don't even own a metal record (with the exception of Rush, Led Zeppelin and Slade if you want to consider them as metal. They are according to the movie) but this was a really good movie. As a documentary it is solid and entertaining. The film does a good job of explaining the history of metal and all its sub-genres (there is a really good family-tree/map in the film that explains it all). The film does an excellent job of exploring some of the elements that seem confusing to someone who isn't a die-hard fan. It features some great interviews too. Dee Snider is a lot more intelligent than one might assume and Ronnie James Dio seems like a really nice guy. One interesting thing we learnt in the Q and A after the movie is that Sharon Osborne is a supreme bitch who blocked the filmmakers every attempt to set up interviews with Ozzy and Tonny Iommi (they finally got the Iommi interview by going through another manager he has). I would recommend this movie to not just metal fans but anyone who is a fan of music or movies.....so basically anyone.
tags: tiff, toronto international film festival, heavy metal, movies
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