In 1945, after their defeat, a group of Nazis involved in a secret space program rocketed from Antarctica to the dark side of the moon. Over a period of seventy years, they constructed flying saucers and a huge, swastika-shaped space fortress on the moon. Now, in the year 2018, the Nazis have finalized their plans to return to earth and conquer it. Their leader “Moon Führer,” played by Udo Kier (from Dogville, Dancer in the Dark, Blade), sends two officers, the ruthless Klaus Adler (played by Götz Otto), and Renate Richter (Julia Dietze), to prepare for the invasion.
Meanwhile, back on earth, the incumbent U.S. president, played by Stephanie Paul (whose likeness to Sarah Palin, complete with hairstyle, glasses and accent, is remarkable) decides that a moon mission would be a fitting way to garner re-election publicity for her 2018 election campaign.
Thus begins the tale of a battle for supremacy on earth in Iron Sky.
I Had a Dream: How the Iron Sky Idea Was Born
Directed by second-time Finnish film maker Timo Vuorensola and produced by Tero Kaukomaa of Blind Spot Pictures (which brought us Dancer in the Dark), the movie gained a great deal of surprise attention surrounding its world premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival, which closes on February 19. It is the most expensive Finnish film ever made, is mainly in English with a few subtitled passages in German, and there are no Finnish actors in it.
So why make a movie about Nazis in space? A few years ago, Vuorensola, who directed Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning, was approached by a writer friend who had had the idea after having a dream about Adolf Hitler.
“Science-fiction has been going around this idea for a long time – circling around Nazis in space,” the 33-year-old director says in an latimesblogs interview. “Why circle? Why don’t we just do Nazis in space?” And, once the director and his team started looking into it, they thought "yes, this actually is a topic that would be really interesting,” said Vuorensola.
From Moon Nazi Idea to Movie Implementation – and Discussions
Production for Iron Sky began six years ago, after the makers had taken the teaser to the 2008 Cannes Film Festival looking for financial assistance. The film ended up being a Finnish-German-Australian co-production. A little more than 50% of the EUR 7.5 million budget was contributed by Finnish sources, including Energia Productions, which did the visual effects for Iron Sky; the rest came from the German production company 27 Films and Australia’s New Holland Pictures.
Oliver Damian of 27 Films liked the story’s pitch. “I was immediately really fascinated, and I thought straight away, ‘We need to do it,’” he said. “It’s unbelievable, and there are no such projects in Germany.”
Due to the subject matter, however, it was not easy to find funding in the country still dealing with the aftermath of National Socialism and Hitler’s reign. “Starting from early on, I had a lot of discussion,” Vuorensola said. “‘Does it have to be Nazis on the moon?’ ‘Could it be communists?’” Vuorensola asks in the latimesblogs interview. “As if it would be better! Or could it be not Nazis but bad guys or aliens?”
Black comedy with political satire aspirations?
There is also an uncomfortable element to watching Iron Sky. There is a scene, for example, when astronaut James Washington (played by African American Christopher Kirby from Matrix) is sporting bleached hair and wearing white face paint and uses the salute “Sieg Heil!”
But Vuorensola says, “I like […] the black comedy aspect; you can do things that aren’t funny, [present] in a way that is supposed to be funny, he says in a Wall Street Journal Speakeasy interview.
Possible parallels could also be drawn between the conservative, Palin-like right-wing American president character and the Nazis of the 1940s. Here Vuorensola explains that there are a few messages in the movie. One of them is international politics and the way rhetoric was used in the 1930s. The director believes that political language of today has elements of the language from the past; he hears it increasingly in America and Europe. “There’s definitely the right wing movement of America [having] the same vibe as the political vibe in the 40s in Europe … I do think that people should listen to it, open their eyes and listen to what language they’re using,” he said in Speakeasy.
Using Crowd Funding and Social Media for “Participatory Cinema”
An interesting element to the behind-the-scenes production of Iron Sky was Vuorensola’s use of the internet, social media and crowd funding to get creative and financial support for the movie. It is essentially a collaborative effort between the film makers and the online community - about one million euros of the budget came from Iron Sky fans.
The Iron Sky team maintains direct contact with over 200,000 fans on a weekly basis. These fans belong to some of the following networks: 75,000 on YouTube; 53,000 on Facebook; 55,000 on the Iron Sky website.
The collaborative “participatory cinema” platform used is called Wreckamovie.com. The film makers give the fans tasks – anything from naming a movie character to building a 3D model of a starship. Even suggestions for plot development were accepted for "Iron Sky."
According to the Iron Sky website press release, fans will be “rewarded with movie tickets, cash, tickets to the film's premiere and other suitable ways.”
Contention, Debates, Critique of Iron Sky
With such a volatile topic as Nazis and earth invasion, it is no surprise that the movie has received some criticism and raised a few eyebrows.
In the Speakeasy interview, Vuorensola is asked about the debates circulating in the United States and in Germany about his film.
“It’s a funny thing,” the director says, “you make a movie about Moon Nazis and the people who get offended are the Americans … I was expecting the Germans to take it badly … I find that when you make fun of Americans, but you aren’t an American, it’s not always accepted … Germans said it wouldn’t have been possible to have been done by a German director, but as a Finn I can do that.”
Release dates for Iron Sky
In Europe, Iron Sky opens at Finnish theaters on April 4, 2012, and April 5 in Germany. In the United States, it will be screened at the South By Southwest (SXSW) film festival on March 10, 2012. Release dates in other countries are to follow later this year.
MyHue McGowran - A published print and online journalist, Mý Huê is currently a self-employed translator, copywriter, editor. She lives in Vienna, ...
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