Anvil! the Story of Anvil: Review By B. Alan Orange

Anvil: The Story of Anvil is a true mixed media experience. To get the full weight of the story being presented, you must not only watch this acute doc*mentary about their accession from Canadian obscurity, you must also read the novel of the same name, and then head out to your local musical venue and catch them in the act of performing their classics live. Then, and only then, will you fully understand the plight of what many consider the first true Heavy Metal speed outfit.

The group has been together forever, and are only now starting to get the attention they’ve strived so hard for over the years (whether its deserved remains in the ear of the beholder). It all starts and ends with this new doc*mentary by former Anvil roadie and one-time Bush drummer Sacha Gervasi. He is best known for his work behind the scenes as the screenwriter of Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal and the little seen indie comedy The Big Tease. Here, he’s taken the obvious docutreatment utilized in stirring band profiles such as Metallica: Some Kind of Monster and the spoof Spinal Tap to capture the fleeting trail of stardust known as Anvil, and then craft their story of survival into an inspirational comedy of errors. Eye opening and certainly uplifting, it hits the same stirring, teary-eyed notes as last year's Young@Heart.

It’s best to watch the film fresh, without reading too much into it. The journey is as heartbreaking as it is funny. It’s okay that you’ve never heard of Anvil. Most metal heads will scrunch their nose and swear they were fans while rifling through an old shoebox of cassettes for any evidence to support that claim. The sad fact is: Most people don’t know this band. Or their genre defining music. Anvil came at the forefront of the metal movement, and went on to inspire every single super group still thriving today. Sadly, they weren’t able to catch and contain the fame most of these bands earned for themselves. They fell off the map after their fourth album, and never broke back into the big time. Despite that fact, they’ve continued to pursue the rock star life and achieve their dreams of fortune and glory. The film picks up during the production of album thirteen, which is made courtesy of a family loan. And it’s interesting to learn of their backstory amidst their current social status as opposed to seeing them rise and fall beforehand. Entering this world as a stranger, we’re able to laugh at Lips' job as a Meals-on-Wheels deliveryman. It’s the sort of unwritten reality every mockumentary strives to achieve. Knowing of their pains and struggles before watching the doc*mentary makes scenes like these a little less easy to swallow.

Sasha eases us into their world with a steady hand. He sets them up as goofs, and then slowly pulls back the blanket on their unconventional wizardry. Rob “Robbo” Reiner and Steve “Lips” Ludlow vowed at fourteen to “rock together forever”. And they’ve never broken that bloodring of trust. After stumbling face first off the rock carousel in a reach for that coveted brass ring of stardom, these two best friends for life are still at it well into their fifties, playing their heavy music to anyone that will listen. At first, they look like a pair of geezers harboring excessive delusions of grandeur. We are set loose with them as they embark on a European tour that is as shifty and conflict riddled as any band’s first foray into touring. With each new nightmare comes another peel off the onion. We gradually learn about their rise to popularity in the 80s. How they perfected the art of speed metal, and sold it to a new generation of musicians. And how they blew bands like Motorhead, Metallica, and White Snake off the stage show after show. We wouldn’t know it to look at them, but they were the sh*t. The more we learn about their struggles, the sadder the film becomes.

Anvil: The Story of Anvil falls forward in this interesting sort of progression. Its part reality TV show, part true rock biography. Their past achievements are intermingled with their current status as the Canadian Super Band that never was. What starts out as a hilarious ode to the work of Christopher Guest suddenly becomes a harsh life marathon of hope. Watching these two musicians hold onto this evaporating dream through clinched teeth becomes increasingly uncomfortable. The only shinning light at the end of the tunnel is their music. We get to see a great deal of live footage, both old and new, and the tunes have certainly withstood the test of time. If anything, the film will urge you into your local record shop for a copy of the soundtrack (which isn’t yet available). That plays greatly into the magic of the film itself. Once you reach the end of this journey, which doesn’t really end at all, you will want to know more about these guys. The movie serves as a gateway drug into the recently published book, which was written by Robbo and Lips. It covers their entire back-story with great precession. Both mediums, consumed together, make you yearn to see them live on stage. Once you’ve learned their entire history, and witnessed their intense power on stage as a live act, you will feel compelled to return to Sacha’s film. And it is an entirely different, extremely intimate experience that second time through.

What struck as funny the first time around will suddenly seem very morose and depressing. We can’t help but think of the thousands of artists who’ve befallen a similar fate. The book offers a fairly detailed journey through the reasons why they failed. When you know that part of the journey, it all becomes a little harder to stomach. Each upturned moment seems like a wrench in their plan, and you have to wonder if God is laughing at them, disgusted by their chutzpah. What Sasha has created here is a perfect doc*ment of the American dream gone awry. This is what we’re all striving for. And this is what becomes of more than most of us. Luckily for the audience, these two “brothers” have never given up on their aspiration to truly rock out. They keep the flame alive, and give us a little bit of hope in these harsh times.

Maybe you don’t know this obscure Metal band right now, but you certainly will after you submit yourself to the Anvil experience. Anvil! The Story of Anvil? Whoop-doo!

(All of B. Alan Orange’s reviews are based on the Boo! or Whoop-doo! evaluation system.)