Favorite Films: Nightrage Frontman Marios Iliopoulos Is Enthralled by King Kong, ‘Dark Knight,’ ‘Wild at Heart’

“It’s a difficult thing to be an artist, man. You use your brain and a lot of energy. It’s the same with us musicians. We are working a lot with our mind. Some people think we are lazy or that actors do nothing, but it’s a lot of mental work.”

-Nightrage’s Marios Iliopoulos

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One of The Bad Penny‘s favorite people in the whole wide world is Marios Iliopoulos, a rare human being who has a heart so big that it’s perplexing how his body can contain it, who has zero ego even though he fronts the best Greek metal band of all time, and who has generously donated hours of his time to speak with us about everything under the sun.

Previously, we brought you our conversations with Marios about his band Nightrage, the scourge of authoritarianism and fascism spreading across the world and his heartwarming friendship with sorely missed At the Gates frontman Tomas Lindberg.

Now we present you with what might our most entertaining chat with Señor Iliopoulos, as part of The Bad Penny‘s ongoing Favorite Films series. In case it’s not already obvious, the feature revolves around us speaking with musicians about movies that have won them over.

Without further ado, here’s our exchange with Nightrage innovator Iliopoulos about his flicks of choice.

Do you remember the first movie that you saw in the theater?

That’s a very good question. King Kong [from 1976], maybe? It’s still way better than the Peter Jackson version, even. It was either King Kong, Conan the Barbarian or Flash Gordon. King Kong and Flash Gordon are my ultimate movies. They’re on the top, top, top tier.

I would never have guessed those cinematic choices. Do you think they had more of an impact on you because you saw them when you were a kid?

Yes, of course. When you’re a kid, at least with my generation, the effects seemed that you could really think that buildings could fall that way.

When I see movies today, they still bring me back to the earliest ones I saw. Even though King Kong sometimes looks like a puppet and doesn’t look real sometimes, it’s still a great, great movie. The earlier ones were in black and white, and it’s actually one of those older King Kong movies that inspired Peter Jackson to make [2005’s] King Kong. That’s also an awesome movie, of course.

King Kong movies also remind me of The Towering Inferno. There was an obsession in the ’70s about huge buildings falling, it seems. I also like movies by Dino De Laurentiis, the Italian-American film producer. He had a lot of money and invested a lot in Hollywood back in the day. He’s dead now, of course, but he was a very big producer back in the day. He did the 1980 remake of Flash Gordon, the 1976 remake of King Kong, Conan the Barbarian …

I’m a movie maniac and go to the cinema about once a week. They better not close them down, due to Netflix or whatever. There are so many killer movies coming up – The Odyssey, The Avengers, Spider-Man … we should all go to the cinema and watch them,

Did you see Oppenheimer in the theater?

Oh yeah. It was incredible. Christopher Nolan is an amazing director. The Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies as well. I was just thinking about it yesterday. I think it might be my number two or three favorite movie ever. It goes up every time I see it. It’s a perfect movie.

I never liked Heath Ledger in any of his previous roles, but my God, if that’s not one of the best acting performances ever, I don’t know what is. He’s so good.

It’s a haunting performance. He got into the role so much, and in the end … if that’s a risk of becoming an actor, it’s not talked about that much. Like, you assume that a race car driver knows that they are going to crash and might get injured. But you wouldn’t think that an actor would have to face that threat just by making a movie. It’s a difficult thing to be an artist, man. You use your brain and a lot of energy. It’s the same with us musicians. We are working a lot with our mind. Some people think we are lazy or that actors do nothing, but it’s a lot of mental work.

Going back to Conan, I grew up with Conan the Destroyer, which is the second movie in the series. It was one of the only movies I had at home, so I watched it endlessly and could replay every moment in my mind. I didn’t see Conan the Barbarian until, like, 10 years after that. I’m guessing you think Barbarian is a better movie than the sequel yeah?

Well, the first one is an amazing movie by John Milius. He directed that movie, and it was one of a kind, [in part because they] found the perfect actor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to play Conan. Nobody else could actually play that role. They couldn’t find somebody with the same physique. He became a superstar, I think, from that movie.

Conan was a comic book first. Same with Flash Gordon, I think.

What do you like most about Flash Gordon?

Flash Gordon is an escape. And there are so many amazing actors in it, like Max von Sydow playing Ming. It’s kind of a B-movie, doesn’t have the best effects, and if a kid now watches it, he’s probably going to laugh because the special effects look dated. But still, the story and the pace and the storytelling is amazing. Plus Queen did the soundtrack, and they’re one of my favorite bands. The combination of the movie and music is unmatched. I really hope they’re going to shoot another one. I could see that doing really well.

Another Dino De Laurentiis flick was the original Dune from 1984, which David Lynch infamously half-completed. What’s your take on that one?

I really like that because it’s a brutal movie and in-your-face. The new one, by Denis Villeneuve, is a very epic movie. Of course, he got advantage of the special effects studies nowadays. It’s more accurate and more awesome, with a very good story.

Are you a Lynch fan?

Yeah. My favorite one of his is Wild at Heart.

Me too.

Crazy movie, but it’s got this beautiful love story at the same time. It’s really touching. And nuts. And brutal. And scary. When I watched it in the cinema the first time, I was blown away. I couldn’t understand what I was watching. Like, what is this? But it stuck in my mind forever – the same way that Clockwork Orange, one of the best movies ever filmed, did. Stanley Kubrick was one of the best directors ever. That last movie he did with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman [Eyes Wide Shut], he made no compromises and was very truthful about his art.

Those high-prestige directors can do whatever they want when they hit 75 or 80 years old. I don’t think anybody touches a Scorsese movie or gives him notes or anything. And Taxi Driver, still to this day, is crazy, man. There’s another one. It’s how you see a lonely guy who ends up getting crazy. And the big surprise at the end of the movie … all these stories are very true to what is going on in our world. There’s a lot of loneliness. There’s a lot of pain. There’s a lot of injustice. These movies we’ve been talking about really do show what’s actually going on in our society.

Dive deep into Nightrage’s world on their Bandcamp page.

For more Favorite Films editions, check out these past installments in the series:

• Favorite Films: Daedric’s Kristyn Hope Digs ‘Godzilla,’ ‘Companion,’ ‘Halloween,’ Rob Schneider ‘Comedy’

• Soulburn Are Passionate About ‘Silence of the Lambs,’ ‘Shining,’ ‘Lighthouse’ and 2 Flicks Starring Denzel and Depp

• Fireball Ministry’s Emily Burton Digs ‘Jackie Brown’ ‘Aliens,’ ‘Big Trouble in Little Lebowski’ … and a Pick You’d Never Guess

• Tim and Eric Turn Vancouver Psych Squad Meltt Into a Puddle of Laughter

• Dez Dare Digs Nicolas Cage, Mia Goth, ‘Moon,’ ‘Midsommar,’ ‘Ex Machina’ (and Puppets)

• Martin Atkins (Ministry, Pigface) ‘Bedazzles’ Us by Picking a Comedy With Dudley Moore, Peter Cook

• The New Loud Pick Their Favorite David Lynch Films

• Dummy Give Thumbs-Up to ‘Psycho Goreman,’ ‘Megan,’ ‘Creep,’ ‘Nosferatu’

• Jacob the Horse Singer Digs Russ Meyer, Nolan, Tarsem Singh, William Friedkin

• Dying Remains’ Frontman Treasures ‘The Thing,’ ‘Suspiria,’ ‘City of the Living Dead,’ ‘Wounded Fawn’