After the rhythmic, energizing and danceable ''24/7'', Ewigheim makes a one hundred eighty degree turn and offers the smooth, introspective and dreamy ''Schlaflieder''. Obviously, the album title doesn't refer to ordinary lullabies but rather talks about eternal sleep which is a euphemism for death. The sinister lyrics describe death as a destiny and salvation that one should rather embrace than fear because it's a part of all our lives. These philosophical lyrics can be seen as very liberating, profound and realistic if you or someone close to you faces death. If you are a fragile person, mentally unstable or already in a suicidal mood, these emotional lyrics can though be dangerous because they describe death as something trivial, omnipresent or even desirable.

Musically, the band focuses on soft keyboard patterns, numbing piano melodies, a smooth yet precise rhythm section, simplistic guitar riffs and elegant baritone singing. The crooning, dark and low vocals are hypnotizing, mournful and seductive. They can be seen as the trademark and highlight of this record and remind of a more relaxed alternative to Moonspell, Tiamat and Type 0 Negative. The vocals are supported by doom and gothic metal riffs, simple and sorrowful piano melodies and numbing electronic background sounds. This mixture convinces most in the comforting and enchanting opener ''Schlaflied'', the longing and melancholic ''Einmal noch'' and the elegiac ''Wir, der Teufel und ich II'' that manages to tell an epic story despite its concise length.

There are only few tracks that venture into mid-tempo territories and feature some more poignant riffs like the rhythmic ''Himmelsleiter'', the urgent ''Besessen & entseelt'' and the closure of the gloomy ''Dies ist der Preis'' where heavy guitar riffs are in the foreground. In general, this album should rather be categorized as depressive or gothic rock but not as a metal output. Imagine a gloomier version of Anathema and Katatonia and you might have a better idea of what to expect. If you like sinister rock music that needs some time to open up, focuses more on the overall atmosphere than on songwriting aspects of each specific track and delivers profound lyrics offering some food for thought, this record will grow on you as it did on me. It's an album for special moments only that truly unfolds its magick during rainy and dark autumn or winter nights. If you are expecting a bleak and desperate riff-based gothic metal record, you might find this release rather underwhelming and should approach this album cautiously.

Final verdict: 82%

From a purely objective point of view, ''Yoga Hosers'' could be seen as one of the worst movies ever made. The story is extremely weak. The movie has several big plot holes. The acting performances are somewhere between average and terrible. The characters are quite one- dimensional. The special effects are extremely cheap. The movie is filled with stupid stereotypes about Canadians and Germans. The German, French Canadian and English Canadian accents are also stereotypical and while a few expressions and pronunciations are employed correctly, they are completely exaggerated and annoyingly repetitive. The movie also rips off other films, characters and even actors. Even the soundtrack seems to have been put together in a very odd way where the main actresses perform famous classics in mostly horrid ways.

And yet, from my subjective point of view, I adored ''Yoga Hosers'' from start to finish and not only despite but because of its flaws. If you are ready to switch your brain off, have some fun and watch this movie with a few friends, this is an entertaining, light-hearted and surprising party movie. It doesn't have the diversity, intensity and uniqueness of its predecessor ''Tusk'' but it has its very own style and might also have a small but faithful cult following in the years to come.

The movie literally got me into it right from the start. I'm a huge fan of metal music and its diverse sub-genres, so when the film opened with a reinterpretation of Anthrax's famous ''I'm the Man'', I got my first positive surprise. The new lyrics for the song aren't very innovative but they are amusing and the idea itself is quite cool.

The characters in this movie are so stupid, stereotypical and one- dimensional that it's actually funny. From the horny, obsessive and possessive stepmother over the angry, closed-minded and severe physical education teacher to the hysterical, megalomaniac and narcissistic villain, you get a whole series of hilariously entertaining characters. I somehow liked the so-called school hottie who actually looks plain horrible and who pretends to be a gentleman and turns out to be a satanist. His slightly retarded sidekick is another stereotypical character that is so over-the-top that I had to laugh about him all the time.

Throw in a lot of interesting story ideas and you get a very unusual potpourri. The historic references to Canadian national socialist Adrien Arcand show that the makers of this film are actually familiar with Canadian culture and history. The movie also makes fun of cheap magazines and the obsession of media with stars and starlets in general. The idea to center this story around two bored, cynical and naive female store clerks who are addicted to their cell phones and judge everyone and everything around them is also quite interesting. It's actually interesting to live this story from the point of view of two unsympathetic anti-heroes that symbolize stereotypically everything that might be wrong with the new millennium's generation. The older generation isn't portrayed in a more favourable way though and is often depicted as conservative, grumpy and prejudiced. The film also lives from its numerous cameo appearances featuring Johnny Depp as weird French Canadian police officer, Justin Long as surprisingly aggressive yoga teacher with weird marketing ideas and slogans and Kevin Smith as the face of an army of miniature monsters made of sausages and sauerkraut.

This leads us to the incredible story line. A follower of French Canadian national socialist Adrien Arcand, a doctor from Berlin called Adronicus Arcane, purchases some land in Winnipeg, builds a subterranean palace, creates an army of tiny sausage warriors with sauerkraut blood, places himself into cryopreservation and plans to wake up one hundred years later in order to conquer North America. He wakes up three decades too soon after a power shortcut caused by a band performance in the back-store of a convenience store. He decides to send out his sausage warriors to kill people and get their body parts to build an ultimate monster suit for his sausage warriors. Unfortunately for the villain, he is living below the convenience store of two bored female clerks, naive high school students and yoga enthusiasts who will team up with a strange French Canadian police officer to save their country.

Let's put this simple. If the story sounds like a cool idea to you, you will like this movie like I did. If you think it's the worst thing you have ever heard, do yourself a favour and avoid this controversial cult flick. If you are somewhere in between, watch this at your own risk. I can't wait to watch the final instalment of the True North trilogy called ''Moose Jaws''.

Final verdict: seven out of ten bratzis

From a purely objective point of view, ''Yoga Hosers'' could be seen as one of the worst movies ever made. The story is extremely weak. The movie has several big plot holes. The acting performances are somewhere between average and terrible. The characters are quite one- dimensional. The special effects are extremely cheap. The movie is filled with stupid stereotypes about Canadians and Germans. The German, French Canadian and English Canadian accents are also stereotypical and while a few expressions and pronunciations are employed correctly, they are completely exaggerated and annoyingly repetitive. The movie also rips off other films, characters and even actors. Even the soundtrack seems to have been put together in a very odd way where the main actresses perform famous classics in mostly horrid ways.

And yet, from my subjective point of view, I adored ''Yoga Hosers'' from start to finish and not only despite but because of its flaws. If you are ready to switch your brain off, have some fun and watch this movie with a few friends, this is an entertaining, light-hearted and surprising party movie. It doesn't have the diversity, intensity and uniqueness of its predecessor ''Tusk'' but it has its very own style and might also have a small but faithful cult following in the years to come.

The movie literally got me right from the start. I'm a huge fan of metal music and its diverse sub-genres, so when the film opened with a reinterpretation of Anthrax's famous ''I'm the Man'', I got my first positive surprise. The new lyrics for the song aren't very innovative but they are amusing and the idea itself is quite cool.

The characters in this movie are so stupid, stereotypical and one- dimensional that it's actually funny. From the horny, obsessive and possessive stepmother over the angry, closed-minded and severe physical education teacher to the hysterical, megalomaniac and narcissistic villain, you get a whole series of hilariously entertaining characters. I somehow liked the so-called school hottie who actually looks plain horrible and who pretends to be a gentleman and turns out to be a satanist. His slightly retarded sidekick is another stereotypical character that is so over-the-top that I had to laugh about him all the time.

Throw in a lot of interesting story ideas and you get a very unusual potpourri. The historic references to Canadian national socialist Adrien Arcand show that the makers of this film are actually familiar with Canadian culture and history. The movie also makes fun of cheap magazines and the obsession of media with stars and starlets in general. The idea to center this story around two bored, cynical and naive female store clerks who are addicted to their cell phones and judge everyone and everything around them is also quite interesting. It's actually interesting to live this story from the point of view of two unsympathetic anti-heroes that symbolize stereotypically everything that might be wrong with the the new millennium's generation. The older generation isn't portrayed in a more favourable way though and is often depicted as conservative, grumpy and prejudiced. The film also lives from its numerous cameo appearances featuring Johnny Depp as weird French Canadian police officer, Justin Long as surprisingly aggressive yoga teacher with weird marketing ideas and slogans and Kevin Smith as the face of an army of miniature monsters made of sausages and sauerkraut.

This leads us to the incredible story line. A follower of French Canadian national socialist Adrien Arcand, a doctor from Berlin called Adronicus Arcane, purchases some land in Winnipeg, builds a subterranean palace, creates an army of tiny sausage warriors with sauerkraut blood, places himself into cryopreservation and plans to wake up one hundred years later in order to conquer North America. He wakes up three decades too soon after a power shortcut caused by a band performance in the back-store of a convenience store. He decides to send out his sausage warriors to kill people and get their body parts to build an ultimate monster suit for his sausage warriors. Unfortunately for the villain, he is living below the convenience store of two bored female clerks, naive high school students and yoga enthusiasts who will team up with a strange French Canadian police officer to save their country.

Let's put this simple. If the story sounds like a cool idea to you, you will like this movie like I did. If you thing it's the worst thing you have ever heard, do yourself a favour and avoid this controversial cult flick. If you are somewhere in between, watch this at your own risks. I can't wait to watch the final instalment of the True North trilogy called ''Moose Jaws''.

''I as in Icarus'' is a slow-paced yet very tense French conspiracy thriller that convinces with a realistic plot inspired by true events, an intense series of investigations and a strong acting carried by Yves Montand as incorruptible prosecutor.

The movie is obviously inspired by the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Just as in the true case, the president of an anonymous, globalized and modern country gets assassinated in his car by a sniper. Just as in the original case, the main suspect dies under mysterious circumstances and is declared the sole executor of the crime. Just as in the historical events, a prosecutor refuses to accept this thesis and investigates further, unveiling step by step an unspeakable conspiracy that might shake up the world as one knows it.

Another inspiration for the movie comes from the fall of Chilean president Salvador Allende and the rise of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship. It's important to know that lead actor Yves Montand was raised in a communist family and had openly criticized the violent revolution in Chile prior to the making of this movie. While more conservative viewers might criticize this movie for its underlying anti-governmental left-wing message, this film can't be seen as a propaganda picture since it raises far more questions than it actually answers. In addition to this, the film was at the pulse of its time when conspiracy theories were quite popular.

Another important element of this movie is the Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures which is shown, explained and analyzed in detail in relation to mass genocides such as the abominable crimes of Nazi Germany in this film. This element is related to potential executors being used such as pawns in a game of chess.

All these elements offer a lot of food for thought to the viewer and also request quite some background knowledge, especially for younger contemporary audiences who might not be familiar with the events and experiments mentioned above. This is what makes this movie intellectually challenging, profoundly philosophical and an authentic document of its time in retrospective. This factual approach of the movie translates into detailed conversations, precise investigations and a unique ending as opposed to more emotional, stereotypical and vivid conspiracy movies in the key of bigger Hollywood pictures. Even though some elements of the film might seem old-fashioned today, the film's plot is still unusually captivating which makes this movie one of the very best of its kind. 

To keep it short, this is one of the very best, if not the best conspiracy thriller of all times. It's unconventional, rebellious and realistic as it's clearly inspired by social and political events of the sixties and seventies. More than anything, it's an intellectually challenging film about the price of truth. Concerning its intentions, it makes me think of the equally brilliant ''Twelve Angry Men''. Those who like clever suspense movies should definitely be familiar with this often forgotten and still underrated masterpiece. Those who are simply looking for an entertaining crime film, might have to deal with some information overload.

Hillward – Flies in Amber Stones

December 2, 2016 in Reviews by Sebastian Kluth