Miniature

Rating: Null/10 (29 September 2011)

As far as comedies go you may find wrier stuff; but few that is wry about being dumb and vacuous but spirited for that. This is a cult film by now, especially in heavy metal circles. It's a better kind of fun, being able to laugh at yourself or how you viewed the world at one point.
These people feel they matter, even though the music is mid-tempo chugging such as as was dime a dozen in 80's metal, the lyrics dumb - here deliberately over-the-top - but passing themselves as commentary, and the fans feel they matter; but we know they don't.
The mockumentary tropes have been copied everywhere since, but they still work better than most here. They key is this godsend gift of the British; balance between where the joke begins and where the rest of the surrounding world is polite enough to let unfold.
There is no scatological confrontation such as we find in Hollywood; everything is offered and accepted - jokes about vomit, sexism, dead drummers - with a kind of stoic grace. These people are brainless but endearing.
This is why the wrap-around is so marvelous and has endured so well. We get a film that taps into the lives of people who feel they have tapped into the lives of people, who perceive themselves at the center of the world yet are continuously baffled to realize they revolve in some obscure periphery and no one cares. Their song about Stonehenge, full of dumb self-important musings about druids and ancient mystery, is confounded by a tiny Stonehenge prop; the ridicule literally descends on stage from above, the laughter here divine.
It is a loving - never fully cynical, cold, mocking - affect though, that we may recognize from our own small efforts to matter in the grand scheme. They're still rocking on by the end.