A documentary about the 40 years history of VOÏVOD through interviews, photos, and videos.
Written and directed by Felipe Belalcazar, this documentary will likely only appeal to hard core fans of the band as it clocks in at 2.5 hours, delving deep into the band’s history, their background as a group and as individuals, changes in members, tours, etc. There is a ton here and honestly, it all feels directionless. There is possibly too much here, and a good hour of the film should have been cut out. The story here, that of the band, is not entirely out of interest, it has some good bits here and there, but most of it doesn’t keep the attention and that may be because of how it is told or perhaps because the filmmaker did not feel a need to edit any of it out. There is a ton here, yes it’s important, but let’s be honest here, a lot of it was feeling repetitive and the main parts seemed to be not the ones you’d expect. Tons of time is spent on parts that most won’t care about and a lot less time is spent on things viewers will want more of. There is not a whole lot of performances in here and told of talking which leads to the film feeling unbalanced and too long.
The band members have interesting things to say, but it may have been a bad idea to have them all do their interviews in English. This use of English makes the film lose some of its Quebecois flavor and some of the interviewees’ English is pretty bad. Interviews in French with proper subtitles (which can even be stylized to fit the band) would have been preferable. Yes, English helps a film get a better worldwide appeal, but here the band’s appeal should do that work while getting them more comfortable speaking in front of the camera in their native French would have helped with the film’s energy, its authenticity, its connection with the viewers. This, along with the overly generous runtime, really hurts the film’s chances of keeping the attention.
This is a documentary, so of course, lots and lots gets explained and a lot is explained for folks who know nothing about Quebec which may be needed to some extent, but it also feels a bit overdone in parts, like a map with some arrows could have done the job of explaining quite a few things instead of taking minutes and minutes to do so. There are a few things like this here, things that could have been shortened or removed entirely even.
As for how the film is shot, it looks like you’re run of the mill documentary with people sitting in front of a camera being interviewed where we never seen the interviewer or really hear them much. It’s a one-sided interview and one that is done with many people but without putting them together all that often. Perhaps seeing the band interact more would have help, maybe cutting down the interview time would have helped, maybe just making the whole process more concise would have saved this from being one of those films that is hard to sit through to the end.
The intentions here are lovely and the band that influenced many metal kids in Quebec deserves better than this. They are influential, they are full of interesting stories, but the process here is tedious. VOÏVOD: We Are Connected is music documentary that is too self-indulgent and that could have used a different set of eyes in the editing room, perhaps from someone else than the director to bring in a fresh perspective and remind that while the information is important, keeping the viewer’s attention helps with the message. The film does have some highlight such as a bit of art shown here and there, some more enthusiastic sequences, and some well-done bits, but overall, the 2.5 hours runtime kills it and the disconnect from the band’s original language in the interviews is a disservice to connecting with their Quebecois brethren (one of which this reviewer is). VOÏVOD is an important part of Quebec music history and this documentary feels like it has missed the mark,
This year the Fantasia International Film Festival runs in Montreal from July 18th to August 4th.