PARADISE LOST „Over The Madness – The Story Of Paradise Lost – Pioneers Of A Cult”

Music: Doom/Gothic Metal
Website: http://www.paradiselost.co.uk
Country: England

‘Over The Madness’ is a documentary which tries to span 20 year long career of English Doom/Gothic Metal legend – PARADISE LOST. It is always difficult to make such a film, which is due to the fact that it has to attract not only true fans that will like everything which is about their favourite band, but all metal maniacs in general. Documentaries are meant to present a topic in a thorough and interesting way, so that even a layman will get interested and benefit from them. The discussed film fulfills that condition only to a certain extent.

Diran Noubar, the director, was allowed to spend some time with the band in order to get to know its members better. Generally speaking, the biggest part of the documentary is filled with their recollections and interspersed with some comments given by several guests from other bands. Everything is presented chronologically, starting with the very beginning of the group. The guys tell us how they managed to complete the band’s line-up and even how much they earned from the first concert. There are also some short fragments of the early concert which shows their music style of that time.

After long and detailed information about the beginning of the group, the director serves us a journey through all the albums with a bigger focus on certain breakthrough moments in their history. The release of the album called ‘Host’ is surely one of the twists in their rich career. Both the band members and the guests comment on that album for quite a long time as the record really shocked the metal environment around the world. The guests give their opinions concerning this dramatic change.

Now it is the time to say something about the abovementioned guests. Among others, they are: Matt Archer (first PL drummer), Mille Petrozza, Aaron Stainthorpe, Martin Eric Ain and Alex Skolnick, who made only one comment but quite a significant one as the discussed problem concerned him as well. Their presence and remarks are good addition to the film, although some of them are rather usual type of praising which don’t bring anything interesting to the documentary.

I deliberately didn’t tell all the details of the film in order not to spoil the fun of watching it. I’m convinced that most Paradise Lost fans will be satisfied with the release as it contains a lot of interesting facts, but the thing is that they don’t fully prove the real phenomenon of the band. The documentary just shows their history and nothing else. The biggest drawback is, probably, the lack of archival live concerts and some behind-the-scenes fragments. Apart from one PL show from the early days, there is nothing more like that. Obviously, documentaries are not meant to present the bands’ live abilities, but such excerpts make the film much more attractive for the viewers, especially when they don’t know the band very well.

The content of the second disc is unfortunately very poor. It contains interviews with Barney Greenway (NAPALM DEATH), Christina Scabbia (LACUNA COIL) and Greg Mackintosh. All of them are longer versions of those that can be find in the documentary, therefore it may be boring to watch them, as a lot of facts are repeated. There is also some backstage footage from the show in Greece, as well as a short rehearsal from the same place. The thing is that, the first does not show anything interesting and the latter is too short. As a result, the fragments are typical fillers, which are simply redundant. Last part is devoted to Aaron Aedy’s souvenirs from various tours throughout their career. He presents tour itineraries, festival passes or other reminders which he discusses, adding some funny stories connected with them.

To sum up, the documentary is worth watching, but you can’t count on much, as the movie is not a work of art in the genre. It is visible that Diran Noubar’s film lacks something which would make it more engrossing. It seems that the director wasn’t allowed to use some archival footage, because PARADISE LOST guys surely have plenty of materials which could have been used in such a film. It’s quite strange because Noubar was approved by noone else but the band itself to do the documentary. If so, both parties should have done their best to prepare the document worth the respect which the band deserves.

note: 6,5/10

Tracklist

DVD1
Over The Madness (53min)
Over The Madness – Director's Cut (80min)

DVD2
Uncut interview wieh Greg Mackintosh
Thessaloniki Rehearsal (Jan 2006)
Greece Backstage (Jan 2006)
Uncut interview with Christina Scabbia (LACUNA COIL)
Uncut interview with Mark 'Barney' Greenway (NAPALM DEATH)
Aaron Aedy's Paradise Lost Memorabilia

Line-up

Nick Holmes – vocals
Gregor Mackintosh – lead guitar
Aaron Aedy – rhythm guitar
Steve Edmondson – bass
Jeff Singer – drums