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| Images courtesy of Cleopatra Entertainment |
Cleopatra Entertainment is usually synonymous with the low-budget
regional horror film frequently dabbling in zombies, werewolves and vampires
using an Asylum Entertainment level-sized cast and crew. Their other main source of media output stems
from their recurring music documentaries and/or fictional music/rock
films. Between such fare as The Shock
of the Future chronicling the birth of the female electronic musician, the
animated rock movie Rock Bottom, Dark Sanctuary, The Fabulous
Thunderbirds and a 1991 concert video of the heavy metal band Cinderella. Whenever one of their releases comes up, I
usually prepare myself to take their horror stuff with a grain of salt while
mostly enjoying whatever musical concert or rock documentary offerings come
about.
Which brings us to what is easily unquestionably the
hardest, heaviest rock documentary film the company has ever fashioned and put
out: Wes Orshoski’s searing, intimate documentary portrait of former Iron
Maiden lead vocalist Paul Di’Anno entitled Di’Anno: Iron Maiden’s Lost
Singer. Initially the frontman for
the band, singing with his coarse and abrasive sounding vocalization on the
first two albums Iron Maiden and Killers, the band was an out of
the gate success. Unfortunately that’s
also when the problems with his drug use and erratic prima donna behavior
began, getting himself kicked out of the group and replaced by vocalist Bruce
Dickinson. With the band ascending into
superstardom, Paul Di’Anno was left in the lurch. Following his departure from the band, he
started his own group Di’Anno which lasted a mere two years before
taking on a couple of other acts which also disbanded in between his numerous
incarcerations.
Enter the present day where he’s wheelchair bound with
swollen rotting legs and feet and a partially dislocated knee. Going about small venues and pubs for
meet-and-greets and occasional cover performances where he sings from his
wheelchair, his skyrocketing medical costs and need for surgery and physical
therapy corner him into accepting an offer from a wealthy Croatian fan named Stjepan
Juras who insists he’ll receive better, cheaper medical treatment there. He reluctantly agrees and thus begins the
film’s increasingly graphic and distressing emotional roller coaster of a
journey. Upon arriving in Croatia, due
to miscommunication and displacement, the paramedics don’t know how to get him
on the stretcher or sit him upright and he goes into a panic full of screaming
and swearing. It got so unbearable for a
moment there I almost shut the film off.
Throughout the film, writer-director-editor Wes Orshoski
cuts between past and present, giving a career overview of Di’Anno’s checkered
past juxtaposed with his present ongoing ordeal and increasingly cantankerous
demeanor. People warm up to him trying
to exude comfort and soothing vibes in his direction only for him to bite their
heads off later, even spurring the disdain of Stjepan who was paying through
the nose with his own money to save the man’s life. Later in the story, Di’Anno starts getting lackadaisical
and despite beginning some sort of tour again including with an all-female
cover band The Iron Maidens, his health regresses. Watching the film was sort of like a
straightforward rock documentary and a modern-day episode of one of the many
medical shows regularly traumatizing its viewership on The Learning Channel. The film was prefaced with a warning over
impending graphic content but it didn’t seem to be enough to convey just how
difficult to sit through this film really was.
An excellent, powerful, completely searing and devastating
rock documentary that’s hard to recommend to most people, fans of the band Iron
Maiden and followers of the life, work and career of Di’Anno are in for a
brutal galvanizing shock that’ll leave you feeling either drained or in a
somber if not catatonic state. The film’s
greatest strength involves engaging the viewer in Di’Anno’s journey without the
need for ourselves to be fans of his music in the first place. You can come into this without any interest
in heavy metal music whatsoever and still find yourself caught up in the
painful human ordeal and suffering on display.
Maybe the most unexpectedly powerful film to ever come out of Cleopatra
Entertainment, Di’Anno is one of the new millennia’s greatest rock
documentaries. Difficult and sorrowful,
yes, but also an unblinking gaze into the final days of one of heavy metal’s
most significant and revered lead singers.
--Andrew Kotwicki
