Anvil: The Story of Anvil

Composite Score: 83.5

Featuring: Robb Reiner, Steve “Lips” Kudlow, Tiziana Arrigoni, Toby Kudlow, Gary Greenblatt, Jane Reiner, Andrea Reiner, Ginny Kudlow, Glenn Five, Ivan Hurd, and Christopher Tsangarides

Director: Sacha Gervasi

Genres: Documentary, Music, Biography, Drama

MPAA Rating: Not Rated

Box Office: $951,380 worldwide

Why should you Watch This Film?

                Anvil: The Story of Anvil is a documentary about the career of the underappreciated heavy metal band Anvil, from their roots in the metal movement of the 1980s to their continued attempts to make it big in the mid-2000s. It focuses on the lives of the band’s drummer Robb Reiner and lead singer/guitarist Steve “Lips” Kudlow, looking at the lives of rockstars who are recognized within their genre and industry but never really achieved fame in a major way. It’s a different take on the music documentary, not looking to do a deep dive on the industry but instead on the lives of these musicians who have basically been broke the whole time but have never lost their love for the art. The portrait of these two men and their love for the music and experience of rock touches on deeper themes of work vs. passion and true friendship, which has helped the documentary achieve the acclaim that it has.

Why shouldn’t you Watch This Film?

                Viewers with limited knowledge of rock and/or metal will probably find this documentary a bit outside their range of interest. Its focus on Anvil, the band, means that a lot of the film’s content centers around the world of hard rock – featuring cameos from members of Anthrax, Metallica, Slayer, and others as a way to ensure the bona fides of its subjects. As such, audience members who don’t care so much for that style of music or who have no knowledge of its history will probably find themselves at a bit of a disadvantage. Indeed, for the first few minutes of the doc, it feels like a fictional story that utilizes actual performers and names to set its characters in the real world – think like The Country Bears or Yesterday. Nevertheless, it is a real documentary about real people, which makes it a pretty solid story at the end of the day, if you can get past the heavy metal part.

So wait, why should you Watch This Film?

                Lips and Robb are the key players in Anvil that help it work so well as a documentary about life and not just music. Lips works at a company that caters school lunches and Robb is working to cope with habits of drugs and other substances that he picked up in his days as a rocker. Both men have wives and kids, who feature in the doc as well, and their humanity ends up being the focus of the film – to its benefit – over their musical careers. The film follows the band on a doomed European tour, focusing not on the shows but on the little human dramas that take place between the band members, other musicians, audiences, and those operating the business of the tour. Upon their return home, the film again takes time to listen to each of their fears for the future and desires to make something of their rock careers before turning to their pursuit of a more acclaimed studio album. The album sessions, again, focus on the musicians and not the music, showcased in a blowup between Lips and Robb that leads to both of them threatening to leave. Their promotion struggles that end up culminating in a climactic show in Japan bring the whole story to a close. By highlighting the human element of Anvil, the film takes what should be a simple music documentary and turns it into an intense character drama, centered on these two down on their luck musicians.

                By telling a story that transcends the norms of its genre by focusing on the characters at the heart of the band, Anvil: The Story of Anvil elevates itself to a place of honor among music documentaries, certainly deserving of its place among the greats. Its focus on a metal band is easily forgiven because of the emphasis on musicians over music, which is by far the more interesting approach. This film is available to rent on Apple TV+ or Amazon Prime Video if you’re looking for a place to watch it.