It would be my first time back to the movie theater in this post-Pandemic era and it was 11am on a Sunday. Of course it was to a horror film- did you know horror fans fared better during the pandemic?- but not just any horror film… any intersection or horror and music. STUDIO 666!
This is not new territory; let’s not even begin to delve into The Cramps, The Misfits, Gwars, and White Zombies of the world. Music horror films: let’s discuss:
I may have watched this movie three times in the past six months; this so-bad-it’s-good PMRC-proxy flick features just the right amount of Lambos, Lizzie Borden, Carmine Appice, and Satan.
This movie really captured the demise of rock ‘n’ roll, captured the tongue-in-cheek ‘selling your soul to make it’ trope, and joined the feminist horror cannon. And I own the maneater sweatsuit!
Parts of this movie are fun – but it’s mainly a watch for Alice Cooper and Iggy. And I’ll watch anything with vampires.
This movie was really fun! Cults, black metal, chainsaws, laughs…
OK so this one is maybe only only barely a horror movie, but it is the best of the bunch… it is hilarious and metal saves the day. Also, LARPing is always funny!
Anyway… back to the movie at hand.
I am always in the mood for a good horror comedy. The fact that it was coming from the Foo Fighters camp added just an element of curiosity. Yeah yeah, I was once of those Nirvana fans that was mad when Dave Grohl went off and had another successful band, and here we are now and many ‘kids these days’ don’t even know he was in Nirvana. Actually, that may have been the Foo Fighters of five or so years ago; now that we are tits-deep in ’90s nostalgia, and a new Nirvana fandom resurgence is happening… clearly epitomized by the IG-filtered Kurt Cobain heads you see everywhere like he was the Che Guevara of the ’90s, and then there was the god-awful Batman trailer…
I think Foo Fighter has probably reached that point in their career where they are probably like… what now? It’s cool that they are branching out (though I think they are innately, not a cool band, sorry!) like Metallica have done with their movies, festival, etc. Though when it was over I thought: wouldn’t this have been an awesome, hugely expensive vehicle to announce/promote an album, the departure of a band member, etc…. but as far as I know, it was ‘just’ a movie.
So, I read some complaints about the film not being funny or ‘well-acted’ or whatever, but I really enjoyed it. Everyone has to have their ‘hot take’ now but I don’t think those people understood that the Foo Fighters are a) not actors and b) have always been kind of the kings of cheesy as hell videos. Which dovetails nicely into the genre of horror comedy.
Now, I would never for a second believe- and I haven’t even heard a Foo Fighter’s song in half a decade- that they’d move into a murder house to record their tenth album a la Nine Inch Nails recording The Downward Spiral and suddenly discover the key of L sharp and start playing heavy stoner doom sounds. Nah… I know weed has been legalized most places and all but we haven’t come THAT far yet. The Kerry King, Lionel Richie, and John Carpenter parts were great, the effects were cool (shout out to Ralis!), and the general concept, while not totally original, fit well with the Foo Fighters because it poked fun at them. They realize there’s a lot to make fun of, and they don’t hold back! Good on them. There’s also fun Easter eggs for horror aficionados- Evil Dead, The Shining, Paranormal Activity, the Exorcist, Rosemary’s Baby…
Get thee to thy neer’st theatre and see Studio 666 or watch that shit when it starts streaming soon.
2 horns up, HRC-Bob says “Check it out!”
Word count: 666:)
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