Written by Reem Saleh, Digital Department, DFI

With three major movie theatres still closed in Doha, and only three open, cinema-goers should still expect heavy queues at ticket booths.

Complexes at The Mall (Al Hilal) and Royal Plaza (Al Sadd) are playing Timo Vuorensola’s cult film ‘Iron Sky’.

In 2018, the Nazis, who have been hiding on the moon since the end of World War II, are discovered by astronauts aboard a US spaceship. Nazi leader Adler (Gotz Otto) decides to bring forward his plan to invade Earth. He sets off to find the mobile phone or MP3 player which will help power the Gotterdammerung, a giant spaceship, into orbit. Along for the ride is Renate (Julia Dietze), a female officer, who is increasingly worried by Adler’s violent theology. Read full review here.

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We caught up with the director and asked him about Nazism, film funding and the reaction. The film premiered at the Berlinale festival in February.

Timo Vuorensola, Director of Iron Sky

DFI: How did you come up with the idea of ‘Iron Sky’? Were you worried about approaching Nazism with comedy?
Vuorensola: The idea was actually not my original idea, but my pal Jarmo Puskala’s. We were sitting in a sauna after another long shooting day on my previous film, and he told me about the idea – to make a movie about Moon Nazis. Obviously, we were laughing at it first. But then after we had released Star Wreck we revisited the idea and realised that it’s exactly as crazy as it needs to be for us to get excited about, and we started to do some research around the topic.

It became apparent that a lot of people in the world actually believe that there are Nazis on the Moon, so we had a good basis for the story.

I was of course careful with the Nazi topic, to make the story as anti-fascistic and anti-Nazi as possible, and wasn’t afraid to tackle the topic. I always knew the message I wanted to send out with the film.

DFI: The special effects in ‘Iron Sky’ reference everything from ‘Star Wars’ to ‘Alien’. Which sci-fi films influenced you?
Vuorensola: I was definitely influenced by the sci-fi masters; Cameron, Spielberg, Lucas. Their work has always been embedded in the very backbone of what I’m doing. I was also influenced by a couple of alternative history flicks; ‘The Boys from Brazil’, ‘Fatherland’ and ‘Inglorious Basterds’. In comedy, ‘Dr. Strangelove’, ‘Allo Allo’ and so on.

DFI: You crowd sourced and funded ‘Iron Sky’ for resources and finances. Why?
Vuorensola: To involve our audience, get them engaged to the production, and eventually finance the missing one million Euros of our budget.

DFI: Your 2005 film ‘Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning’ has been downloaded over eight million times. Did you expect it to be so popular?
Vuorensola: We had absolutely no idea. We knew that we would get a bunch of geeks from the internet interested, but we never, ever realised it would become such a huge phenomenon.

DFI: What has surprised you about the reaction to ‘Iron Sky’?
Vuorensola: The Germans’ (response) has been extremely positive, as well as the response to the political satire we’ve pushed in the film. I’m maybe a bit surprised how crazy people see the topic of Moon Nazis’. I’ve been working on it for so many years, so to me it seems like the oldest story in the book.

DFI: Can you name some of your favourite comedies?
Vuorensola: ‘Galaxy Quest’, ‘Red Dwarf’, ‘Spaced’.

‘Iron Sky’ will play at the following times from June 21:
The Mall – 7pm
Royal Plaza – 1pm, 2.45pm