Bruce Dickinson, lead singer of heavy metal gods Iron Maiden is known to look after himself eating well and taking exercise (his love of the sport of fencing has seen him compete internationally) and it keeps him match fit for the band’s gruelling tours. On the other hand there’s Paul Di’anno Iron Maiden’s Lost Singer who had been with the band from 1978 to 1981. Partial to rock n roll, excess drink, drugs and prone to PTSD, anxiety and morbid obesity he frequently confined to a wheelchair with his knees shot to pieces and suffering from sores due to inactivity in his wheelchair and resigned to playing in pubs to hardcore fans of the band. Filmmaker Wes Orshowski follows him from pre and post covid as the vocalist struggles with his rapidly declining health.
The problem with Di’anno….
Confined mostly to a wheelchair and living off benefits the filmmaker follows Di’anno through a bleak chapter in his life where it became impossible for him to walk. With the NHS unable to operate on him until he changed his lifestyle it’s a pair of Croatian superfans that crowdfund money to get him to Croatia where they can afford his surgery. It’s a gesture that should be appreciated but Di’anno is not. A physical wreck through his own lifestyle he’s unwilling to help himself when the surgeon advises him to lose weight so as to at least be able to fly to Croatia. Consequently he has to be driven there and when he does arrives in Croatia he denigrates the superfans who have facilitated all this for not having booked a taxi that can accommodate him and his wheelchair – after that tantrum they would have been in their right to have put him in a cattle truck.
The surgery goes ahead and there’s a boost to his career and he’s able to tour of South America in often inhospitable and for him frequently inaccessible venue. But his inability to swerve the stereotypical life style sees him not help himself by losing weight, taking a bit of exercise preferring instead to puff away on cigarettes and moan about his lot in life. More obese than ever, he should not have been in a venue, he should have been in a pie. He was not without his famous fans who fronted bands themselves and there are contributions from Metallica and others.
The man, the myth…..
Di’anno’s not a sympathetic character, often ungrateful and frequently revelling in self-pity yet there are moments of pathos in this – meeting his old band on their latest sold out world tour and fleeting moments of happiness with a Croatian nurse he gets engaged to.
At one point he claims to enjoy ‘making music and meeting people’ but what the documentary reveals is a man who was always his own worst enemy and something of a loner.
related feature : Iron Maiden Burning Ambition – REVIEW
related feature : Rami Malek, Queen & Mike Myers at the Bohemian Rhapsody World Premiere
Here’s the trailer…
