Until the Light Takes Us Filmmaker Offers a Peak Into Varg Vikernes’ Psyche
Filmmakers Aaron Aites and Audrey Ewell resurrected the story of Mayhem's and Burzum's Varg Vikernes and made it the centerpiece of their documentary, 'Until the Light Takes Us.' While the duo both claim to be fans of the original bands in the Norwegian scene, they don't consider themselves ardent, current black metal fans, which allowed them to approach their subjects with an unjaundiced eye.
"We had done such a huge amount of research about him and the entire scene, including reading every word he'd written and interview he'd done before we actually met him for the first time," Aites told Noisecreep. " My biggest question was 'What is he like when he's not talking about all of this stuff? What does he talk about when he's just relaxing?' Does he play video games?"
The documentarians came away learning a few key things they didn't expect. Aites and Ewell found the well-spoken Vikernes to be "very engaging." Aites also contends that Vikernes, also known as Count Grishnackh during his hellion, church-burning days, "has a very sly and intelligent sense of humor. He is down-to-earth and engaging in ways that do not necessarily come across in written interviews. "
The filmmakers are quick to point out that they don't agree with many of Vikernes' beliefs, which have been construed as white supremacist, but they discovered many layers to Vikernes' thought processes. "He does have intelligent analysis about other things and there's always a line to walk in depicting a person such as him. You don't want to endorse everything he says, but you don't want to nullify his salient points and perspectives. He's a complex character," Aites says. "He confirmed the things I already knew. There were a couple of little tidbits that he let me in on that I hadn't known about before but not much in the way of the rebuilding of the facts." Guess you'll have to wait until the film's bow and/or DVD release to see what Aites and Ewell pulled out of Vikernes.
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