Oslo, 1987. 17-year-old Euronymous is determined to escape his traditional upbringing and becomes fixated on creating 'true Norwegian black metal' with his band Mayhem. He mounts shocking publicity stunts to put the band's name on the map, but the lines between show and reality start to blur. Arson, violence and a vicious murder shock the nation that is under siege by these Lords of Chaos.Written by
British Counsil
From 1983 to 1984, director Jonas Åkerlund was a rehearsal drummer for the Swedish metal band Bathory, which was one of the inspirations for the Norwegian Black Metal bands of the 1990's which are focused on in this movie. He stated in a 2018 interview that when Black Metal culture developed in the 90's and become "too serious", he left the music scene and moved on to film-making. See more »
Goofs
When Varg leaves the video store on 10 August 1993 with a copy of Die Hard 2, the video cases for several films that would not be released until several years later can be seen in the window, including The Bone Collector and Analyze That. See more »
Quotes
Euronymous:
[Hellhammer and Necrobutcher meet up with Euronymous after Dead's suicide; Hellhammer is carrying an envelope with developed photos of Dead's corpse]
Did you get them?
Jan Axel 'Hellhammer' Blomberg:
I got them.
Euronymous:
[Euronymous looks through the photos and picks one out]
This is the one. This is gonna make us famous. Mayhem will be the band with the singer who blew his head off.
[smirks]
Euronymous:
Hey, we should say I ate a piece of his brain, too.
Jan Axel 'Hellhammer' Blomberg:
Yeah!
[Hellhammer laughs as Necrobutcher is disturbed by the conversation]
See more »
Alternate Versions
The US theatrical and DVD releases were cut for an R rating, toning down the gory violence of Dead's suicide, Faust's stabbing and Euronymous' murder.
The unrated 'directors cut' version is only available on Blu-ray in the US. It runs for 118 minutes instead of 116 as per the R-rated version. See more »
Some really disturbing scenes in this piece, based loosely on the tragedy. Not for the faint hearted, some good acting and very lifelike gore.
Not a bad film by any means!
23 of 37 people found this review helpful.
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Some really disturbing scenes in this piece, based loosely on the tragedy. Not for the faint hearted, some good acting and very lifelike gore. Not a bad film by any means!