Mark your calendars! The Netflix movie Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga finally has a release date: June 26.
Will Ferrell — the film’s star and producer, who has spent four years developing the project — revealed this and other details during The Graham Norton Show on BBC One on May 15 — on the eve of Eurovision: Europe Shine a Light.
Wearing a gold glittery jacket, he remarked that he had his “Eurovision jacket on” and proceeded to reveal some tantalising details about the movie.
He first explained how he got into Eurovision in the first place.
“This happened literally twenty years ago visiting my wife’s family in Sweden,” he told Graham via Zoom. “One evening her cousin said, ‘Shall we sit down and watch Eurovision?’ and I said OK. We proceeded to sit there for three straight hours and watch the Eurovision finals while my mouth was slack-jawed. I couldn’t believe what I was watching.”
“Everything that you guys know — the spectacle, the humour in it, and the camp — was intoxicating. I always thought someone has to make a movie about it and no one had. We started to get the ball rolling about four years ago.”
Behold: A first look at the Will Ferrell Netflix movie. Will they be the winners of #Eurovision 2020? ??
— wiwibloggs (@wiwibloggs) May 16, 2020
Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga”
On Friday the first song from the movie’s soundtrack dropped on Spotify. “Volcano Man” is a deliberately camp take on a Eurovision song. Will discussed the music in the movie, which helps give the song some context stylistically.
“I mean we really owed it to Eurovision and the fans to make sure it was well observed,” he said. “So many of the Eurovision songs can be silly — but they’re catchy. That’s what we were aiming for. Fire Saga has some appropriately good bad songs.”
He then named several songs that inspired him while he was doing his research. These include Germany’s 1979 act Ghenghis Khan. “What’s more appropriate than singing about the conquest of Genghis Khan,” he said. “I mean look at those outfits. It’a amazing.”
Finland’s 2006 act Lordi is another. “We have an act in our movie that parodies them as well. That’s just one of the classic images when you think about Eurovision.”
Poland’s 2014 act Cleo & Donatan — with those milkmaids and washer women — also gets a shout. “I just thought this was how they milk things in Poland,” he joked. “I don’t find it erotic at all, it’s just someone making butter.”
His most literal inspiration is Mariya Yaremchuk — she of hamster wheel fame — also from 2014.
“That is something we lifted directly and put in the movie. We kept thinking about something when Fire Saga is singing their song ‘Double Trouble’…we need to do something like the guy in the hamster wheel we saw. The next thing you know the props team is making a huge steel wheel for me to run in. I was lowered about fifty feet down into the ground in a massive hamster wheel, but I’m glad we did it.”
For all bitter and humorless naysayers, if you don’t like it, don’t watch it. This movie will not affect the Contest in any way. More Americans will be interested, but it doesn’t really matter because us Americans aren’t involved anyway.
To me it sounds like it’s going to have a similar vibe to his last film “Holmes & Watson”. Google that and you’ll see why I am not so optimistic.
Yes we do still get the occasional novelty song but to be honest I think in recent years the music in general is quite a high standard. More countries are taking it seriously and top notch artists are involved. Of course it’s an entertainment show but I think it’s worthy of note to highlight the many great songs that come out of the contest. I think this film will feature the frivolous and gloss over the real music.
Am I the only one who actually quite likes the Volcano Man snippet? I think at its heart we have to remember to most people Eurovision is an entertainment show. Yes, I understand it is precious to us and there is some great music entered into it, but it is also a fun TV show. That’s why it has the size of the audience it has. I am sure this film will come from a loving place – I like that it doesn’t take things too seriously and I hope everyone just takes it as a bit of fun. Happy… Read more »
NO JUST NO
The fact that Will Ferrell is the one making this movie made it obvious that it was going to be comedic, with oversize personalities. I think people shouldn’t take it very seriously. The best for the fandom to hope for is that it’s a light-hearted take in the style of something like “Pitch Perfect” or “Blades of Glory”. If that’s what it is it will be a lot of fun.
Disappointing, it’s like making fun of the contest.
What does ‘good bad songs’mean? Is Euphoria a good bad song? Is it Arcade? Soldi? Lane Moje? Give me a break….
I know no one else has used ESC to make a movie so he found a niche topic to use while making some money.
h i do believe that he enjoys it watching but i am sick of seeing celebrities making fun of the contest.
I’d guess by “good bad songs” he was referring to songs like Dancing Lasha Tumbai and Wolves of the Sea, as well as Dschinghis Khan etc, which are a speciality of Eurovision. I agree with you though. While light-heartedness is a key part of the show, it’s definitely the most exaggerated cliche.
The rest of the world thinks Eurovision is weird, and honestly it was the weird acts that got me into it so it should be expected. It’s Will Ferrell and a bunch of Americans, why wouldn’t it be making fun of the contest and have comedy.
Eurovision is known for being crazy and weird, of course it’ll be made fun of by many but what’s wrong with that if it makes it more popular, that’s why most people watch it anyway