| Sam Dunn | |
|---|---|
Sam Dunn performing live with Burn to Black, 2005 |
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| Born | Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
| Occupation | director, musician, anthropologist |
| Awards | Gemini Award in 2007 for Metal: A Headbanger's Journey SXSW Viewers Choice Award in 2009 for Iron Maiden: Flight 666 Tribeca Film Festival Audience Award in 2010 for Rush: Beyond The Lighted Stage |
Sam Dunn is a Canadian anthropologist and film-maker whose work focuses on the culture of heavy metal. Together with Scot McFadyen, Dunn owns Toronto-based production company Banger Films, Inc.
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Dunn's first film, co-directed with Scot McFadyen and Jessica Wise, was released in 2005. The film follows Dunn on a journey to document the origins, culture and appeal of heavy metal. It also explores the themes of heavy metal- violence, death, religion and Satanism, gender and sexuality.
Released in 2008, Sam directed a new film, titled Global Metal. In the film, directors Scot McFadyen and Sam Dunn set out to discover how the West’s most maligned musical genre – heavy metal – has impacted the world’s cultures beyond Europe and North America. The film follows metal fan and anthropologist Sam Dunn on a whirlwind journey through Asia, South America and the Middle East as he explores the underbelly of the world’s emerging extreme music scenes — from Indonesian death metal to Israeli Oriental metal and Chinese black metal to Iranian thrash metal, etc. The film reveals a worldwide community of metalheads who are not just absorbing metal from the West – they are transforming it, and creating a new form of cultural expression in societies dominated by conflict, corruption and mass-consumerism.[1]
Dunn co-wrote and co-directed the 2009 documentary Iron Maiden: Flight 666 with Scot McFadyen. The film chronicles the band's 2008 tour in which a converted Boeing 757 was flown from country to country by Iron Maiden vocalist Bruce Dickinson.
In 2009 Sam Dunn and Scot McFadyen started working on a documentary about progressive rock band Rush. The film premiered at the 2010 Tribeca Film Festival in New York on April 29, winning the festival's Audience Award. [2]
Dunn has produced the documentary series Metal Evolution for VH1 Classic on various metal genres. Its premiere was on November 11, 2011, considered by many to be National Metal Day.[3]
A look at the origins of Satan and his influence in popular culture. This movie is still in pre-production.[4]
Dunn formerly played bass for the Victoria ska/funk band, Fungkus; they disbanded in 2000. Dunn also formerly played bass for the Toronto extreme metal band, Burn to Black; they disbanded in November 2008. One of Sam Dunn's first bands was Dementia, he played bass. He also formed the progressive thrash metal band Scrape Chamber years later with Kelly Nordstrom.
| Year | Film |
|---|---|
| 2005 | Metal: A Headbanger's Journey |
| 2008 | Global Metal |
| 2009 | Iron Maiden: Flight 666 |
| 2009 | Joe Bonamassa:Live From the Royal Albert Hall |
| 2010 | Rush: Beyond The Lighted Stage |
| 2011 | Metal Evolution |