Norwegian black metal is a myth. It's a story filled with larger-than-life characters, startling events, and lingering mysteries. And for many, it stands as an irresistible beacon of authenticity (no matter how ugly), bereft of cynical market-based calculations.
But Norwegian black metal is also a myth because it has been mythologized. In one reckoning, churches were burnt by heroic, Siegfried-esque avatars of a resurgent paganism—but in another version, they were reduced to cinders by bored teenagers born into a placid and accommodating society. Viewed from a different angle, the saga of Norwegian black metal is not a grand, romantic tragedy, but just another tale of misspent youth, with a peculiar Scandinavian twist and some unusually tragic consequences.
I resisted watching Until the Light Takes Us for years for exactly this reason. I've grown weary of the mythological edifice that's been built around Norwegian black metal, mostly because it does a supreme disservice to a lot of great bands that have emerged since Varg's cell door slammed shut. There's also the fact that the music in question ranges from genuinely transcendent to criminally overrated, as is the case in most regional music scenes of legend. (I'll leave you to guess which is which; I will admit that I love Filosofem and most of the other Burzum records, but I think most of Mayhem's recorded legacy is indisputably awful).
But I'm happy to say that Until the Light Takes Us is a fascinating and worthwhile film—although maybe not for the reasons the filmmakers, Aaron Aites and Audrey Ewell, had hoped. It's also not without flaws, chief among them the fact that it contributes to the mythological edifice in one very significant and disappointing way, even as it tears another part of it down.
If you're looking for a definitive exploration of the Norwegian black metal phenomenon, look elsewhere; Moynihan and Soderlind's Lords of Chaos is the obvious destination, and it remains an excellent piece of reportage. Until the Light Takes Us does next to nothing to really contextualize the emergence of the black metal aesthetic, and record nerds are definitely going to be disappointed on this front. But frankly, this documentary isn't about music, as embarrassing as that might sound. It's about the scandal, and even more so it's about the people.
Specifically, two people: Varg Vikernes, the man behind Burzum, and Gylve Nagell (aka Fenriz), one half of Darkthrone. While Aites and Ewell speak with others, such as members of Satyricon and Immortal (and Bard "Faust" Eithun of Emperor, who in 1992 stabbed a gay man to death, and appears here as a voice-distorted silhouette), all of these characters are largely inconsequential. The movie is really about Varg and Fenriz, and how they've navigated an enormous myth of their own making.
The segments regarding Fenriz are notable for precisely how banal and prosaic they are: he comes across as a truly regular guy, and even a bit of a geek at times (such as when he finds a Testament tape in a street vendor's bin). Metalheads may be happy to know that Fenriz truly is one of them, down to the marrow of his bones—or they may be disappointed at how thoroughly he undermines the mythology (in which case, they probably haven't heard the last several Darkthrone albums).
Varg is a different story altogether. One ingenious trick the filmmakers use is to introduce him in voice-over, talking about Darkthrone; you don't know that you're listening to the man Sam Dunn aptly called "the most notorious metal musician of all time" until they cut to his iconic, almost cherubic face. On-camera, Varg is winningly charismatic and charming: whether recalling an anecdote from black metal's halcyon days or inveighing against Christianity, his speech is crisp and eloquent. (In a chilling moment, his demeanor doesn't falter at all as he describes Euronymous' murder.) He is an immensely fascinating character, and one can't help but think that maybe the movie should've just been about him.
From Varg's blog: how European musicians should look.
The result is a deeply flawed portrait of the film's central character, and one which can be corrected in seconds by merely glancing over the entries in his blog, which features such entries as "Crypto-Jews at large." While I firmly believe that Varg's artistic accomplishments should not be outweighed by his fringe politics (any more so than the work of, say, Ezra Pound), it's troublesome to see such a shallow portrayal in a film like this. Not just for being inaccurate, but because it contributes to the mythology built up around this milieu; Americans may have trouble mythologizing Varg after hearing about how he stopped playing metal because of its "Negroid" elements, and perhaps that's as it should be.
It's also a missed opportunity: one of the most interesting facets of the growing popularity of black metal with young music nerds outside the headbanger spectrum (who a less charitable commentator might call "hipsters") is the whole-hearted embrace of a band whose politics are essentially neo-Nazi. It speaks to both the decoupling of art from context in the era of streaming and file-sharing, as well as the non-committal political agnosticism of the typical
In the end, Until the Light Takes Us is basically a treat for the fans. Whether they want to worship at the altar of Varg or pillory him will depend on the viewer. I suspect the filmmakers were aiming a bit higher than this, but the last word on the scandalous heyday of black metal this is not. And it's hard not to think that such a definitive account will never emerge, for the simple reason that Euronymous, one of its most central actors, isn't here to provide his version of the story.
Endnote: a much more revealing and interesting depiction of the genre is provided by the YouTube documentary "One Man Metal", which profiles three modern descendents of Burzum: Xasthur, Leviathan, and Striborg. I thoroughly enjoyed this doc for its resistance to hoary Norway worship, and for its shockingly intimate portraits of the three artists.
The sight of Malefic hanging out on a park bench wearing a backwards LA Kings hat (!) no doubt rustled many a metalhead's jimmies, and would certainly be decried in the strongest possible terms by the teenage incarnations of Euronymous and Count Grishnackh—but after seeing the stark, intense isolation of his lifestyle, it's tough to say that the hateful, misanthropic streak in his music isn't for real. After all, even Burzum had friends.
