Anvil: The Story of Anvil
Started & Finished: 1/6/09
One of the disadvantages to working in movies is not being able to see the actual movies until the hype is over and everyone’s gone home. Sometimes a film really resonates on the screen in a way that can’t be reproduced at home, no matter how big your flat-screen set-up is. It’s hard to say if Anvil would have been one of those films, but it certainly was not meant to be viewed with running commentary by your music-elitist roommate who walked in halfway through and never left.
I don’t mean to be unfair—if I had come in 30 minutes in, I might find Lips and co. a pitiful group of has-beens. But Sasha Gervasi really does an excellent job of toeing the fine line between admiration and mockery. Having read so many glowing articles about the film, billing it as a “real life Spinal Tap,” I was expecting it to err more on the side of satire. Thankfully, it’s a frank and genuine look at two friends’ devotion to a project with middling success over the course of their entire lives.
Though the narrative was a bit formulaic, the pace was refreshing, and a scene or talking head never wore out its welcome. The use of steadicam over handheld for the A-roll was a nice stylistic touch and lent the film a cinematic quality that many docs lack. While the continued existence of Anvil the band doesn’t leave much of an impact on my life, it was rather awe-inspiring to see a person so devoted to their art. And it made me feel guilty for sometimes feeling burdened by this blog.
