Horst in Translation ([email protected])
"Raw Iron: The Making of 'Pumping Iron'" is an American documentary that was released back in 2002, so it has its 15th anniversary this year. Writers and directors are Dave and Scott McVeigh, who are known for other behind the scenes / making of films as well. This one here is of course as the title already suggests about the defining bodybuilding / Schwarzenegger documentary "Pumping Iron" from the 1970s. There are several versions out there of this one. The one I watched and that is included as an add-on on the 1970s film's DVD runs for 43 minutes roughly, but another version also exists and that one runs for 75 minutes almost. But I certainly recommend to watch the shorter or better neither as this felt like a really uninspired watch. It tells almost no interesting facts or snippets about the 1970s movie and recycles footage from the old film on many occasions without teaching anything new, so I don't really see the point why one would not just watch the original movie and stay away from this one here. And of course the usual "look how great we were" sky praising nonsense is in it as well. As a whole, I would say that 4 stars out of 10 is very much on the generous side here and I think that not only does it not succeed in making me curious about "Pumping Iron", but also it's really only worth seeing for the very biggest fans of bodybuilding, Arnie and the 1970s film. Everybody who doesn't fit the description, stay far away!
