Beginning with mid 80s concert footage of a never-heard-of-them foursome channeling Spinal Tap and ending more than two decades later with a rousing, touching validation for a long-forgotten Canadian metal band, “Anvil! The Story of Anvil” spans the spectrum of emotions as few movies recently have in one of the most moving and human musical documentaries ever made.
The archival video that opens the film presents a triumphant Anvil on stage in 1984 at a massive rock festival in Japan. Lead singer and guitarist Steve “Lips” Kudlow swaggers before the fervent thousands sporting a bondage harness and a big goofy grin as he strums his electric guitar with a dildo. Drummer Robb Reiner wields two sticks with speed metal ferocity. They tear into their signature anthem, “Metal on Metal.” Big Hair, Big Noize. This was their exact apex moment as the band’s career fizzled, and quickly. Yet, this Headbanger’s Ball asterisk earned adulation for their thunderous sound and technical proficiency. Unequivocal props are delivered by Slash, Lemmy, Lars Ulrich and Scott Ian; all mystified at the demise of the audacious heavy metal group. There were no drug induced purges or stints in Her Majesty’s prisons or fatally toxic band dynamics. “The Story of Anvil” is not about tortured lives and talent spurned. Things just didn’t work out as they would have wished. The two long-haired ever-presents in the band, married, middle-aged and friends since the age of 14, hold down jobs during the day — Lips delivers school lunches and Robb works as a handyman — while performing on free evenings to rowdy, fervent crowds in nondescript bars in the Toronto area.
A cycle they’ve repeated for the better part of two decades, given where they’ve been and where they’d still like to go, it’s extraordinary in its ordinariness. “Anvil” intimately and fascinatingly follows these two regular dudes in their seemingly quixotic quest to resurrect Anvil to its former glory.
A few years ago, just after Lips turned 50, the band snagged an opportunity to play gigs in Europe and the images captured by the filmmakers of the European tour are mesmerizing. Lips, especially, envisions the tour as a springboard and it opens quite promisingly at a large festival in Sweden. As he notices rock legends strolling the backstage area, Lips’s sweetness is infectious as he acts not like a contemporary but as a giddy fan, all rushed sentences and hopeless anecdotes. Did he really think legendary drummer Carmine Appice would remember a brunette on a Toronto street from 30 years before? He’s an endearing fellow, and his enthusiasm and optimism will be excruciatingly tested when the tour dissipates into a fiasco. In a Spinal Tapish moment, Tiziana, the girlfriend of the band’s other guitarist, Ian, is the overwhelmed tour manager. (Ian and bassist Glenn have been earnest members of the band since the mid 1990s) She mishandles schedules and overlooks the most basic details of life on the road. Trains aren’t reserved. Gigs aren’t confirmed. In the Czech Republic, Lips erupts after a meagerly attended show when a Prague club owner stiffs the band. A slightly tipsy English solicitor who just happens to be in the club and overhears the kerfuffle speaks a basic truth about Anvil’s circumstances when he intones that in Europe the band should be playing before crowds in the thousands. (With Tiziana at the helm, it’s almost surprising that they weren’t booked to play an air force base.)
As the tour slinks into its sixth week, they arrive in Transylvania for the final show and in a 10,000 seater auditorium perform before only a paltry 174 rockers. Yet Lips won’t speak ill of Tiziana. He’s an incredibly decent man as back in Toronto he comes to her defense and says she gave her best. (It’s an illuminating instance of his sincere generosity and perhaps speaks to why the band sputtered when success seemed an easier option.)
With a bond more like brothers than friends, Lips and Robb are both children of Jewish immigrants but stark contrasts in upbringing and temperament. The ebullient Lips was raised in a family — with the notable exception of an older, generous sister — which saw his musical pursuits as fanciful, at best. His face regularly breaks into a toothy, childlike grin that cannot be muted by his still disappointed mother and disapproving accountant and endocrinologist brothers.
Conversely, the introspective Robb flourished artistically in an endearingly encouraging home environment. He quietly but movingly tells the story of why he wears a necklace in honor of his deceased jeweler father, Villi, a Hungarian Jewish Auschwitz survivor. A droll and reflective soul, Robb provides one of the funnier segments in the film as well when he takes the filmmakers on a tour of his artwork.
But both are surrounded by folks who not only care for them but share their dream. (It’s a good-hearted film with very few public villains.) Both are married to long-time spouses who are unerringly supportive, grounded and patient; Robb’s wife is only too aware that her hair still foreshadows that she loves 80s metal.
The boys also recruit an old ally, producer Chris Tsangarides, the force behind their most potent work in the early 80s, to help oversee their latest (and 13th) full-length album, which is funded by Lips’ benevolent sister. They travel to Dover, England, where the kindly and sagacious Tsangarides finetunes the demos into structured songs. But he is also the perfect personality to alleviate the strain of the recording regimen. When Lips and Robb blow up in a particularly venomous sibling-like tiff, Tsangarides is the even-tempered salve. The honest, raw emotion from the session where Lips and Robb reconcile with Chris’s help is powerful and touching.
They may rage against each other (with the concomitant apologies and hugs) and rail against the machine that is the record industry, with record labels earning the particular ire of Lips, but they never disparage the fans. They never complain that folks just didn’t get them. (In a recent One-Hit Wonder program on American television, it was disheartening to see the number of performers who denigrated their listeners for, of all things, adoring their music, even if it was for one selective song.) Lips and Robb have been let down and dismayed by the machinations of the business but they aren’t cynical; they truly love playing and genuinely appreciate the audience, even a rowdy barroom in Etobicoke. They desperately want to play bigger stages worthy of their talent but they won’t disparage the modest venues and patrons.
In a career where they have clearly relied on too many of the wrong people to their detriment, they couldn’t have found a more worthy person in whom to place their trust than Sacha Gervasi. A first time director (and a fan since at least the age of 19 in 1985), Gervasi crafts their story with respect and care. He documents the travails with a dogged determination. And there’s the right mix of Spinal Tapish humorous moments (yes, it does go to 11) and sincere emotion so that the funny doesn’t overwhelm the passionate. Gervasi also creates a film which keeps surprising throughout with a narrative that at times seems almost fictional and a world-wide span of characters worthy of literature.
“Anvil! The Story of Anvil” is a testament to the essence of art and the creative process, and Lips’ romantic fervor and Robb’s quiet drive are the genuine quotidian embodiments. It’s easy to root for such good, authentic fellows. Do nice guys win? They do, if they say they do.
