One of the producers, Samuli Torssonen was responsible for the amateur Star Wreck animated short films in the 90's, which I remember watching as a child in wonder, and I wasn't even a Trek fan. They were horribly crudely made but they had this certain appeal to them which made the so called "comedy" work. Later, recognizing the name, I saw the feature Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning and absolutely loathed it. It felt like 12-year old schoolboys acting out a school-play, which only their own class mates laugh to. What worked on a silly 2d-animation didn't on a feature.
Later on seeing the Iron Sky trailer, I was astonished. I actually got interested again and was hoping they had learnt the lesson, after all they had foreign actors and an outsider to write the script this time.
But the sad truth is that as the film progresses, it just gets duller and duller and starts to feel like a student film with lots of money... And since it is not well written comedy, but relies on single occasional jokes here and there but not quite becoming a crazy-comedy - which it should've been - but fails in being a moralising satire, it just makes you laugh once or twice. So the need of a well told story becomes even more important.
The outer space CG is delivering, but why bother when other areas, especially the chroma keying was so horribly done. You can actually see the blur added to the silhouettes of characters. Nothing fits, the background compositing looks fake. I know it's a B-movie but then make cardboard sets and lose the disturbing edge transitions. They alienate the viewer.
What works on Iron Sky is the professional actors. Without them, it would have been another In The Pirkinning. But even they have their weak moments because of the clumsy scenes and dialogue.
Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate the power of crowd funding, making a huge effort with a small budget etc - but all you fan boys and girls out there have to acknowledge that in all storytelling, the story -- and telling -- come first.
No amount of CGI or references to pop-culture will make a movie great. If that would be all we'd need, we'd just be watching demo reels and music videos.
But maybe the third one will be the charm. I guess the makers might read these reviews so I'd recommend them to make the next feature with less weight on the CGI and all the weight on storytelling. Robert McKee's book called Story would be a great place to start.
Later on seeing the Iron Sky trailer, I was astonished. I actually got interested again and was hoping they had learnt the lesson, after all they had foreign actors and an outsider to write the script this time.
But the sad truth is that as the film progresses, it just gets duller and duller and starts to feel like a student film with lots of money... And since it is not well written comedy, but relies on single occasional jokes here and there but not quite becoming a crazy-comedy - which it should've been - but fails in being a moralising satire, it just makes you laugh once or twice. So the need of a well told story becomes even more important.
The outer space CG is delivering, but why bother when other areas, especially the chroma keying was so horribly done. You can actually see the blur added to the silhouettes of characters. Nothing fits, the background compositing looks fake. I know it's a B-movie but then make cardboard sets and lose the disturbing edge transitions. They alienate the viewer.
What works on Iron Sky is the professional actors. Without them, it would have been another In The Pirkinning. But even they have their weak moments because of the clumsy scenes and dialogue.
Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate the power of crowd funding, making a huge effort with a small budget etc - but all you fan boys and girls out there have to acknowledge that in all storytelling, the story -- and telling -- come first.
No amount of CGI or references to pop-culture will make a movie great. If that would be all we'd need, we'd just be watching demo reels and music videos.
But maybe the third one will be the charm. I guess the makers might read these reviews so I'd recommend them to make the next feature with less weight on the CGI and all the weight on storytelling. Robert McKee's book called Story would be a great place to start.