Last night I attended a local showing of the brand new biopic Lords Of Chaos, a film based on the book of the same name about the early days of the Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. It was a night of evil, death and a surprising amount of laughter. As the Jehovah’s Witnesses make their way around my neighbourhood as I write, let me tell you about this sordid tale.
For a quick primer on the story, it largely centres around the black metal scene in 80s/90s Norway. During this period, members of “The Black Circle” were engaged in various activities of questionable merit like church burnings, murder and pure unadulterated self-promotion. The events of that time resonate right through to now and is a significant touchstone in the history of heavy metal. I’ll touch on some of the real-life events further on so here’s a minor spoiler warning, but it is based on a true story so…I’ll try to be coy I guess? Is that a good word? Yeah let’s go with that.
Before I get to the review proper, I have to give special credit to the staff at Event Cinemas Innaloo. I went to a special one-off session and they certainly made it an experience to remember. They lit (electric) candles, played black metal and dressing up in robes to scare everyone walking in. It really added to the atmosphere and they should be congratulated for going the extra mile. Now, let’s talk about the movie itself.
I admit, going into this I didn’t quite know what to expect. Let’s face it, there’s been so many books, documentaries and articles written about those incidents in the 80s and 90s that the story has been analysed into oblivion. It didn’t help that the first footage I saw of the movie was that music video they made for the Metallica song “Manunkind”. It was so off-putting seeing this well-known black metal act play a song by the most famous metal band in the world. It didn’t fit Mayhem’s style in the slightest. The big question is, once I’d actually seen the movie, did they capture the spirit of the music and time period? In short, yes. They freakin’ nailed it.
One thing that often gets overlooked in the narrative is how young everyone was at the time. They make a point to note that, when Varg Vikernes was arrested for his murder of Øystein Aarseth (aka Euronymous), he was 19. In a weird way Lords Of Chaos is a heart-warming coming of age story. Many portions of the film felt like episodes of The Inbetweeners or Skins, with me having to stifle my very genuine belly laughs for the benefit of the other cinema patrons. That’s not to say it’s an outright comedy as the movie does touch on a lot of dark and serious subject matter. It could have been handled in a very sensationalistic manner and…I admit there are points where it is, but for the most part the movie’s much more of a character piece rather than a “oh look at all these disgusting crimes isn’t everyone sinister and kind of cool and sexy” exploitation film. There’s some genuinely interesting interpretations as to how the events unfolded. The participants start with a desire to appear evil and satantic, but further on the situation grows into a game one-upmanship where they try to outdo each other with larger and larger criminal acts which spiral out of their control. They’re certainly shown as being naive teenagers in way over their heads.
The actors should be given a lot of credit as they are magnificent. Rory Culkin and his six-pack plays Euronymous, who for all intents and purposes is the main character. It’s uncanny how similar he seems to the accounts of the actual Euronymous. He’s both very human and a pure capitalist in exploiting black metal’s own notoriety, seemingly throwing people under the bus when convenient to enhance his own image. Similarly Jack Kilmer as Dead is freakin’ intense. I can’t imagine what it would be like to play a suicidal Swede like Dead, but there’s an energy there that makes his relatively brief appearance in the film unforgettable. Emory Cohen’s Varg Vikernes is something else too. At the start he’s portrayed as a bit of a bumbling fool, which I feel was a very deliberate choice to try and show how he changes and becomes radicalised through the course of the film. In a weird way, given all the unintentionally hilarious YouTube videos the actual Varg has put out in the years since 1993, I can see how they came to that interpretation of the character. Cohen’s even got Varg’s smug smile right when he thinks he’s saying something smart, what I like to call his “Well Actually…” face.
Honestly all the actors are great and truly capture that chaos that befell Mayhem’s early career. There’s even a cameo or two, like Attila Csihar being played by his own son, Arion Csihar, while the band records their first full length album De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. As a side note it was also a little surreal hearing all these American accents in a story set in Norway, but hey, if I can overlook Sean Connery playing a Russian, I can engage some suspension of disbelief here. Besides which I’d much rather them use their normal speaking voices as opposed to putting on some vaguely European affects that make them sound more like the Swedish Chef from The Muppets.
Something I really liked about Chaos was the sheer attention to detail. You know that one sentence fact that you saw in that one YouTube video that one time on the subject? There’s a high chance it’s actually in the movie. I haven’t read the book the film is based on so I can’t compare, but in terms of the factual events of the period, they all seem to be here. Sure it’s hard to know whether the dialogue is 100% accurate to real life, but I don’t think anyone’s going to sue the filmmakers for libel over that. It’s a biopic, not a documentary. You could also tell the filmmakers knew their stuff about the music itself. Hell, there’s even a scene where Euronymous is wearing a Sadistik Exekution shirt, one of Australia’s early metal bands from around the same time period. That’s some serious metal nerd cred.
Apparently a lot of the research for the film was based off of all the photographs taken by the original black metal scene and it shows. They replicate the look and feel of the era down to a tee. In fact photography is a bit of a reoccurring theme, with many characters taking photographs as part of the story. From band shoots to just photos of drunken parties, the electric eye is ever present. It almost feels like a deliberate symbolic undertone to point out the hypocrisy of the characters eschewing fame in what they say, yet actively seeking it in the things they actually do. This is actually brought up in dialogue near the end of the film, so I’d say it’s a valid interpretation.
I could honestly talk all day about this film but this review is getting long enough as it is. I want to keep going but I’m having to pry myself away from the keyboard with a crowbar. If you’ve read this far, just see the movie. It’s a fascinating character study that I’ll buy the blu-ray of for many, many rewatches. Preferably while having Wikipedia open on my phone to help me spot all those fantastic little easter eggs.
