Review - Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga is, surprisingly, a film about the Eurovision Song Contest. Clearly it wasn't planned this way but you may have noticed we didn't get an actual contest this year due to EVENTS, so this is the slightly strange replacement. It is the story of Fire Saga, a fictional Icelandic band who dream of representing their country in the regrettably real Eurovision Song Contest. Unfortunately, they're not very good. From there, they enter into Iceland's contest to decide the representative and you know exactly where it goes from there. That's one of the biggest problems I have with the film, it is incredibly predictable. I know, I know, it's a comedy and most people don't care about that, but from about twenty minutes in, I could have told you pretty much every single story beat. This is only a shame because there are occasional hints towards something much more surreal. If you've ever seen the film Drop Dead Gorgeous, you'll know what I'm on about, it's that level of gleefully twisted for brief scenes. Otherwise, this is pretty much just a feature length version of that one episode of Father Ted, which has only been a way of praising a film in the case of Speed.

When people aren't busy shouting their punchlines, they're usually giving fine performances.

Performances can make or break a comedy and they... are certainly in this film. Presumably, what will draw most people to this film is Will Ferrell. I like plenty of Ferrell films, I'm the proud owner of both Anchorman films, but over the last decade he seems to have been doing little but coasting by. Having just scanned his IMDb page, the most notable roles are his Tim and Eric collaborations, President Business in The Lego Movie and of course, his role in 30 Rock as Shane Hunter, star of the in-show show MILF Hunter. The point I'm making is, Ferrell has largely been doing the same thing over the last ten years and that doesn't change here. He is doing sad-pathetic-man-child-who-somehow-succeeds thing. If it works for you, it works. It doesn't work for me. Fortunately, some others in the cast do work. Rachel McAdams is charismatic and nice to look at. Pierce Brosnan is charismatic and nice to look at. Dan Stevens though, genuinely pretty solid. Aside from Beauty and the Beast, he's never given a bad performance and while this is on the lower end of his spectrum, he is slimy and strange and utterly watchable whenever he is on-screen. Other than that, there's a couple of cameos from real life Eurovision performers (who I am ashamed to say I recognised about half of) and when people aren't busy shouting their punchlines, they're usually giving fine performances.

Fire Saga tries to have its cake and eat it, by both making fun of the contest and then using it to reinforce the togetherness of the world. 

You can likely already sense the negativity in my words and that stems from the fact that this film just is not that funny. I did not laugh a single time during the film. A couple of moments raised a smile from me, but little more than that. What makes that fact especially depressing is that this film is two hours long. To be that long and that unfunny is only tolerable if you are one of the Godfather films and needless to say, Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga is no Godfather. The other big problem it has is how it feels about the actual Eurovision Song Contest. For those of use who watch it, we're split heavily into two camps; big fans who will watch it every year as a celebration or people who think it's utter rubbish yet will still also watch it every year. Fire Saga tries to have its cake and eat it, by both making fun of the contest and then using it to reinforce the togetherness of the world. This is only exacerbated by bringing in actual Eurovision commentator Graham Norton. Usually, Norton is an acerbic force in the competition, making no secret of the fact that his technique basically just consists of getting drunk and rolling with it. Here, his comments and their savagery are reigned in and he is also used to tell the audience that now is a moment of genuine emotion that we should be paying attention to. Annoyingly, not choosing a side between mockery kind of works. It dulls the humour but it meant that I had something of a warmth as the film ended. Somehow, it managed to be just mediocre enough to prove that it wasn't as bad a film as I feared. It was just more forgettable.

You don't have to watch this film, because any of the good or memeable bits will be shared by the Netflix social media accounts over the next few months (or in fact, have already been shared in the five days between this post coming out and the film being released) and you can spare yourself the two hours. With that said, we're still in lockdown, you may have little better to do and I can't fault you for making the decision to watch a flashy new film on Netflix, when it's exactly the decision I made. In the end, Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga barely exists, neither being particularly interesting nor massively insulting. It is simply a two hour thing that exists, earning the rating of a