If you want to see rap superstar Eminem (220 million albums sold!)-as in the multiple award-winning and even Oscar-winning drama “8 Mile” or most recently at a Cameo in Adam Sandler's Slapstick parade “Happy Gilmore 2”-is wrong with “Stans”. Because the film by director Steven Leckart (“Challenger: The Final Flight”) is a documentary about him, but above all a partially exciting, then uncomfortable view of the phenomenon fan obsession using the example of the Detroiter and some of his most loyal supporters.
The whole thing is named after his best-known song “Stan” from 2000, which reached number 1 on the single charts in Germany. At that time, the text was inspired by some fan letters that the rapper received. The stanzas of the song assigned to the rap-lenenre Horrorcore are written in the form of a letter and describe the fictional correspondence between Eminem and a young man named by him, who ultimately ends tragically.
Eminem alias Marshall Bruce Mathers III has been celebrating great success on stage since the 1990s-but fame has its price!
In a good 100 minutes, Leckart tells the career of the hip-hop history stars from a commercial point of view-with all its enormous heights and very deep valleys. There are exclusive discussion segments with Eminem itself and a lot of archive recordings as well as insights into his creative process. In addition, there are interviews with companions, friends and role models such as rapper/actor LL Cool J, rapper/producer Dr. Dre, comedy superstar Adam Sandler and British pop singer Dido, his duet partner on “Stan”. Even Devon Sawa, the “Final Destination” star, who embodied the title figure of video clips, which was nosted to death at the time, has a short appearance. Sawa doesn't speak, but he plays his role from back then. So far, so reasonably conventional. But the film offers more than a nasty career retrospective.
The majority of the term take statements from self -proclaimed “Stans” from the USA and Europe, which report what they combine with music, texts and, above all, the person of Eminem. They all believe that they know him-from television, online videos or from the press, but above all because of his songs and the things they interpret into them. In real life, they have experienced Marshall Bruce Mathers III, as it is called bourgeois, but at most experienced it from the distance of the audience area at one of his concerts.
The narrow line between identification and obsession
These fans describe his vita from the Effective – regardless of whether it is the artistic career or Eminem's private situation. Leckart lets her tell you while he lets the musician walk archive recordings about it. Again and again you will find parallels between his life, his experiences, his texts or interviews and your own life. “I am exactly like him”, “I felt like him” or “I had a very similar childhood” are sentences that we often hear.
One of the “Stans” is proud of their entry in the Guinness Book of Records for the most tattoos of portraits of a stranger on their body worldwide. Another spends his annual vacation in Detroit to make a pilgrimage to the wasteland, on which the now demolished house of Eminem's mother stood. A third, in turn, writes online fan fiction in which you and the star have a romantic relationship with each other. A particularly committed woman even worked in the fast food restaurant for ten years, in which he had been at the grill for a while as a teenager – always in the hope that her idol might walk in one day and order a burger.
Just one of many “Stans” who do not always keep the right level of distance to their idol …
If you listen to the cast, it is no wonder in relation to some of the thoughts that are almost scary in stalking areas and stories that Eminem has hardly been in public for many years. He also talks about what made the fascination with his person and his work from his own life. For years he was a prisoner in his own house who needed bodyguards because hosts of fans camped in his front yard, followed him everywhere and not only pressed him, but also his little daughter around the clock.
Some of the “Stans” seem to realize in front of Leckart's camera that aspects of their fantum may really be too close to what the psychopathic and ultimately murderous title hero of the song “Stan” says, writes, does and experiences. A few twitching with the armpits, laughing over it and joking. Others, like the Frenchman Zolt, do not want to admit it or probably don't notice it. This phenomenon means parasocial interaction.
Sometimes manipulative – but also effective!
The film spans a narrative arch, which matches the artist's career course, from the modest beginnings and the sudden mega success to massive personal problems towards a reflective, more mature person. This development of the star is mirrored in the last third by the also changing statements of the “Stans”. Sure, this is manipulative and forced by the creator through the cut and the music as well as the displayed of pointed out of pointed out lines of text from eminem hits-but it works and makes the work a round experience.
Conclusion: “Stans” not only describes the phenomenally successful career of the rapper Eminem, but also shows the influence of the star and his pieces on the thinking, feeling and acting of his most loyal supporters. Exceptional documentation that is not perfect and not without a few lengths, but should not only be fascinating for fans of the hip-hop titan.