Iron Sky

Title: Iron Sky

Director: Timo Vuorensola

Released: 2012

Staring: Julia Dietze, Götz Otto, Christopher Kirby, Tilo Prückner, Udo Kier, Peta Sergeant, Aglaja Brix, Stephanie Paul

Plot: In the last days of World War II, a secret Nazi space program established a base on the dark side of the moon. Now in 2018 two astronauts one of which being the black male model James Washington (Kirby) unwittingly spark their plans for the return to earth.

Review: Arriving seven years after the last of director Vuorensola’s cult Star Wreck films which also lead him to co founding “Wreck-a-Movie”. A site which was also used for the production of this film, while also helping with finding the funding for the film with 10 percent of the budget coming from the fans of his earlier films, whom in turn also get recognition for their donation in the credits. Still despite being shot on a shoestring budget the film still looks incredible, with the heavy use of CGI largely cutting out the costs of set construction, while bringing back memories of both “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” and “Casshern”.

Right from the start it is clear that the plot is being played very much for laughs, which is always a plus for myself when it comes to any form of naziploitation. For the more bonkers and insane you can make it, the more I’m likely to enjoy it, as no one really needs to sit through a cinematic reinactment of their hideous acts. In fact it would seem that since these Nazi’s have been on the moon they have very much lost any form of contact with earth and hence maintain the same styles of dress which they arrived with, while their equipment is frequently retro in styling or years behind current technical advances, as especially seen by the fact that a mobile phone has more power than their seven banks of computers, making it clear that while times might have moved on back on Earth, it's still very much 1945 here!

Still having realised what they are lacking the new Führer Wolfgang Kortzfleisch (Kier) is quick to send the highly ambitious commander Adler (Otto) back to earth to obtain new technology, in the hope that they can launch their ultimate battleship “Götterdämmerung”. Accompanying Adler is the Earth specialist Richter (Dietze) whose qualifications are questionable to say the least when it consists mainly of edited prints of Chaplains “The Great Dictator” and the deluded Nazi ideals they carried with them from earth. Unwittingly though their return is spun into the latest campaign of the President of the United States (Paul), who intentionally bares more than a slight resemblance to Sarah Palin and whose frenzied aide (Sergeant) is soon using the arrival of Richter and Adler to launch a new Nazi-style re-election campaign to surprisingly successful effect.

However despite being setup as a comedy, the film doesn’t feel the need to sacrifice the plotting in order to cram in extra laughs and instead Vuorensola has chosen to opt for an almost natural humour throughout, with the film only featuring a handful of intentionally staged funny moments throughout. Meanwhile Kirby is a natural comedic talent, who only becomes funnier the more frenzied Washington becomes, especially when dealing with the fact he has unbeknown to himself been turned into an albino by Nazi head scientist Doktor Richter (Prückner) who for some reason also looks like Albert Einstein, which was almost as random as Captain Gorden in “Godzilla: Final Wars” who bore a striking resemblance to Stalin!

Vuorensola on the whole has assembled a great cast here, with Udo Kier bringing his trademark raspings to the role of the frustrated Führer, constantly being forced to correct his men’s salutes of “Heil Hitler” that his name is not Hitler! Infact the casting of Kier was so central to this film that Vuorensola stated that he wouldn’t make it without Kier. Equally fun to watch is Otto as the fanatical idealist Adler, who when not embodying the Nazi ideals, spends most of his time trying to find ways to eliminate Kortzfleisch on his personal quest to become Führer, though with Paul's almost detail perfect portrayal of a Palin esc. president, it would seem in these modern times, the ruthless quest for power is very much the same no matter which side you stand on.

 

The real selling point for the film is with its climax which sees Vuorensola unleashing Space Zeppelins and B-movie flying saucers on New York, while the earth nations all unleash their own space ships and finally answering the question as to what the Australian space program would have been like. Even though Vuorensola is working with such a minimalist budget he still pulls off some fantastic action sequences and making you question why the likes of “The Asylum” and the other DTV studios have never been able to replicate CGI of this standard? Meanwhile the soundtrack is equally aiming for bigger things much like the rest of film which refuses to be restricted by such things as limited budget, with the soundtrack being a powerful combination of a rousing orchestral score incorporates leitmotifs from the operas of Wagner, while the Slovenian industrial group Laibach also effectively appear throughout the soundtrack. 

Originally one of my top picks for this year “Iron Sky” oozes 50’s B-movie chiq with a dash of naziploitation to flavour, it’s nice to finally find that the film is more than just a fun idea, especially with so many negative reviews surround the release of the film I honestly did enter expecting the worst, only to be pleasantly surprised, while also packing a few surprises along the way. Meanwhile Vuorensola continues to impress as a director and one I’d like to see perhaps working with a larger budget for his future project.