Title: Iron Sky
Director: Timo Vuorensola
Released: 2012
Staring: Julia Dietze, Götz Otto, Christopher Kirby, Tilo
Prückner, Udo Kier, Peta Sergeant, Aglaja Brix, Stephanie Paul
Plot: In the last days of World War II, a secret Nazi space
program established a base on the dark side of the moon. Now in 2018 two
astronauts one of which being the black male model James Washington (Kirby) unwittingly spark their plans for the return to earth.
Review: Arriving seven years after the last of director
Vuorensola’s cult Star Wreck films which also lead him to co founding “Wreck-a-Movie”. A site
which was also used for the production of this film, while also helping with finding the
funding for the film with 10 percent of the budget coming from the fans of his
earlier films, whom in turn also get recognition for their donation in the credits. Still despite
being shot on a shoestring budget the film still looks incredible, with the
heavy use of CGI largely cutting out the costs of set construction, while bringing back
memories of both “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” and “Casshern”.
Right from the start it is clear that the plot is being
played very much for laughs, which is always a plus for myself when it comes to any form
of naziploitation. For the more bonkers and insane you can make it, the more
I’m likely to enjoy it, as no one really needs to sit through a cinematic
reinactment of their hideous acts. In fact it would seem that since these
Nazi’s have been on the moon they have very much lost any form of contact with
earth and hence maintain the same styles of dress which they arrived with,
while their equipment is frequently retro in styling or years behind current
technical advances, as especially seen by the fact that a mobile phone has more
power than their seven banks of computers, making it clear that while times might have moved on back on Earth, it's still very much 1945 here!
Still having realised what they are lacking the new Führer
Wolfgang Kortzfleisch (Kier) is quick to send the highly ambitious commander
Adler (Otto) back to earth to obtain new technology, in the hope that they can launch
their ultimate battleship “Götterdämmerung”.
Accompanying Adler is the Earth specialist Richter (Dietze) whose
qualifications are questionable to say the least when it consists mainly of
edited prints of Chaplains “The Great Dictator” and the deluded Nazi ideals
they carried with them from earth. Unwittingly though their return is spun into
the latest campaign of the President of the United States (Paul), who intentionally
bares more than a slight resemblance to Sarah Palin and whose frenzied aide
(Sergeant) is soon using the arrival of Richter and Adler to launch a new
Nazi-style re-election campaign to surprisingly successful effect.
However despite being setup as a comedy, the film doesn’t feel the
need to sacrifice the plotting in order to cram in extra laughs and instead
Vuorensola has chosen to opt for an almost natural humour throughout, with the film only
featuring a handful of intentionally staged funny moments throughout. Meanwhile Kirby is
a natural comedic talent, who only becomes funnier the more frenzied Washington
becomes, especially when dealing with the fact he has unbeknown to himself been
turned into an albino by Nazi head scientist Doktor Richter (Prückner) who for
some reason also looks like Albert Einstein, which was almost as random as
Captain Gorden in “Godzilla: Final Wars” who bore a striking resemblance to
Stalin!
Vuorensola on the whole has assembled a great cast here, with Udo Kier
bringing his trademark raspings to the role of the frustrated Führer, constantly
being forced to correct his men’s salutes of “Heil Hitler” that his name is not
Hitler! Infact the casting of Kier was so central to this film that Vuorensola
stated that he wouldn’t make it without Kier. Equally fun to watch is Otto as
the fanatical idealist Adler, who when not embodying the Nazi ideals, spends
most of his time trying to find ways to eliminate Kortzfleisch on his personal quest to become Führer, though with Paul's almost detail perfect portrayal of a Palin esc. president, it would seem in these
modern times, the ruthless quest for power is very much the same no matter
which side you stand on.
The real selling point for the film is with its climax which sees Vuorensola unleashing Space
Zeppelins and B-movie flying saucers on New
York, while the earth nations all unleash their own
space ships and finally answering the question as to what the Australian space
program would have been like. Even though Vuorensola is working with such a
minimalist budget he still pulls off some fantastic action sequences and making
you question why the likes of “The Asylum” and the other DTV studios have never
been able to replicate CGI of this standard? Meanwhile the soundtrack is equally aiming for bigger things
much like the rest of film which refuses to be restricted by such things as
limited budget, with the soundtrack being a powerful combination of a rousing
orchestral score incorporates leitmotifs from the operas of Wagner, while the
Slovenian industrial group Laibach also effectively appear throughout the
soundtrack.
Originally one of my top picks for this year “Iron Sky”
oozes 50’s B-movie chiq with a dash of naziploitation to flavour, it’s nice to
finally find that the film is more than just a fun idea, especially with so
many negative reviews surround the release of the film I honestly did enter
expecting the worst, only to be pleasantly surprised, while also packing a few
surprises along the way. Meanwhile Vuorensola continues to impress as a
director and one I’d like to see perhaps working with a larger budget for his
future project.
WOW dude! Great to hear you loved this movie! I am so looking forward to it, the premise is just too damn crazy not to watch. Glad it didnt dissapoint you, I'm sure the general population wont "get it" but b-movie lovers and lovers of the genre will no doubt devour this one, looking forward to it.
ReplyDeleteIt really seems to be dividing people and that's not restricted to the mainstream movie goers, as I've heard even genre fans criticizing it. I think it's best to enter with an open mind and not see it as a laugh out loud comedy, which I think alot of people mistook it for while it is funny, its more in the same way that "Re-animator" is funny.
ReplyDeleteSomething I forgot to mention in the review is also it's surprisingly dark ending, which brought back memories of the original ending of "Clerks" were Dante gets killed.
Still there's plenty to enjoy, while easily one of the more original films of the year.
I had a great time with this, I got what I expected...everybody I know so far liked it.
ReplyDeleteIts a comedy/satire with a nazi UFo twist, and it works fine for me. Hope to see more great things from this team!