Two weeks ago I stumbled across this documentary while watching TV late at night. Maybe you’ve seen it already years ago, but for me it was new, so I’ll write about it anyway haha. Heavy Metal in Baghdad is basically about the only Iraqi Metal band Acrassicauda and how the five guys in the band try to live and survive throughout all the madness that surrounds them in post-war Iraq (a madness that is war itself). Here’s the trailer, links to all parts after the jump!
So what really moved me about Heavy Metal in Baghdad is that this film is not judging anyone or anything, and doesn’t try to explain anything in a theoretical kinda way. All it does is showing five kids like you and me with a love for extreme music in the most fucked up situation ever. I mean, they had to go to rehearsal with guns. Their rehearsal room got hit by a missile. You’re not supposed to leave the house after five o’clock, otherwise you’d probably get shot. In one scene the reporter and the camera guy are sitting on the balcony of their hotel and all you see and hear in the city beneath are gunshots and explosions.
We’re so used to hear about the war in Iraq on the news, with countless numbers of dead people, politicians saying this and doing that, so we tend to forget that there are actually people living there, and not only radical, fanatic ones, but normal guys wanting to grow their hair long, listening to Metal and play some music. Things no one in Western countries would ever even think about, but do it.
As far as I read on the internet the band lives in the USA now and got signed by Vice Records. You can listen to some of their tracks on their myspace: www.myspace.com/wwwacrassicaudas5com
So here are the youtube-links to Heavy Metal in Baghdad:
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 1
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 2
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 3
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 4
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 5
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 6
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 7
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 8
Heavy Metal in Baghdad Part 9
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