Hollywood likes to use the imagery of dark and dangerous bands in a concert setting to illustrate just how fucked up a place the main characters have walked into. We’ve got Cannibal Corpse slamming in the background of Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Chris Farley ripping out some poor guy’s nipple ring while White Zombie jam in the background during Airheads, and Bauhaus losing their minds in a cage at the beginning of the criminally underrated vampire classic The Hunger. The point is clear: Some bands are dangerous.
It’s hard to get more dangerous than the pyromaniacal pornographic industrial metal machine that is Rammstein.
2002 was a weird time. 9/11 had just happened and Americans were shedding their civil liberties like dead skin cells. Our collective terror manifested in plenty of weird ways, one of which was an embrace of extreme sports. It was the perfect environment for the blazing banality of xXx.
For the uninitiated, xXx was basically the X-Games answer to James Bond. The plot centered around an extreme sports hero turned spy and starred Vin Diesel fresh out of his breakout success in The Fast and the Furious. With appearances from the likes of Tony Hawk, Carey Hart, and Matt Hoffman you have almost everything. Almost…
In an inspired move if there ever was one, enter Rammstein. The band, once described by their frontman as “the harder David Copperfield,” kick off the movie in a blaze of fire and filth.
A spy in eastern Europe is trying to escape from danger and attempts to hide out in a club where Rammstein just so happens to be playing. He winds up getting shot on stage and when his body falls the crowd thinks that it’s a stage dive. The spy is crowd-surfed away. Go figure.
In a former church outside Prague, Rammstein performed their song Feuer frei! to a crowd of extras. They shot the movie sequence and the song’s music video at the same time, both directed by Rob Cohen.
It all seems a bit crazy if you don’t know Rammstein, but anyone familiar with the band will attest to the fire-wielding spectacle of their live show, if not the possibility of a dead body crowdsurfing.
For their part, Rammstein hasn’t discussed their appearance in xXx much in interviews. It isn’t out of the question that the post 9/11 politics of the movie were disappointing to the band. Rammstein have made no bones about their feelings on American nationalism, with songs like Amerika and Mein Land serving as direct condemnations.
xXx is indeed a BAD movie. Fortunately, you don’t have to watch very long to get to the good part. Feel free to turn it off after Rammstein and do something productive with your day.
