So, for those that don’t know, I’m a college student. I currently go to the kinda-liberal-arts college Bowling Green State University (I say kinda because, while it is liberal, it’s located in a hick farming town). Because of this, there isn’t much to do, other than play video games, walk along the railroad tracks (actually, that’s illegal now), and drink. But, every once in a while, an event comes along that brings life to this little city. Such an event occurred last night, as I was able to go to a screening of the new nerd-centric musical documentary Nerdcore Rising: The Movie. For those that don’t know, Nerdcore Rising is the story of MC Frontalot, the king (and creator) of nerdcore hip-hop, a style of hip-hop that lends itself to being less about cappin’ bitches and bling and more about pissing on a girl you met at a Star Wars convention and talking about the first time you played Magic: The Gathering. It made its premier at the South-By-Southwest film festival this summer, and has been getting rave reviews ever since.

Not only was the movie brought to my little college, but also the director, Negin Farsad. Farsad is a stand-up comedienne who got into the nerdcore genre when working with the keyboardist for MC Frontalot, G-Minor 7, on a Middle-Eastern musical she was writing. So, needless to say, I HAD to get to this event, not only because nerdcore is an interesting genre of music I don’t know much about, but also because I’m a gigantic fucking nerd, and this movie seems right up my alley.


Epic line is epic.

I arrived at the on-campus Gish Film Theater, expecting maybe about 10-15 other nerds from around campus to come and enjoy the movie. I arrived to a line out the door, waiting to get in. So, as I waited patiently, I was able to talk to a few of my fellow line folk. The people in front of me were from Ann Arbor, roughly 90 minutes away from BG, and the people behind me were from Columbus (they also commented on my awesome Zelda shirt, which was nice). When I got into the theater (which seats about 150-200 people), almost every seat was filled. It was awesome, to say the least, that so many people came out in support of the movie. About 15 minutes after sitting down, the crowd was introduced to Farsad, a very attractive, tiny Middle-Eastern woman from Southern California (now residing in Brooklyn). Being a stand-up comedienne, we got to sit through a small set of hers, talking about the making of the movie, her current projects (including a new show for Comedy Central called The Watchlist), and being Middle Eastern. The set was actually pretty funny. It wasn’t spot-on all the time, but, some of her material was pretty good. If she comes around anywhere near you, I suggest you check her out. Once she was done, we had a small intermission, and then the movie began.


The band in action.

Now, I don’t want to ruin the movie for everyone, so I’ll just talk about some key points I thought were cool:
-The movie begins with words from Frontalot’s fans, talking about how awesome he was. The king champion commenter mentioned that listening to Frontalot was the equivalent of “playing Halo 3 while getting a blowjob from Hello Kitty”. Yeah, we’re dealing with some serious fucking nerds here.
-In terms of cameos, we got to hear words from greats such as Prince Paul from De La Soul, Jello Biafra from The Dead Kennedys, “Weird Al” Yankovic, MC Lars, MC Chris, and freakishly gigantic and funny comedian Brian Posehn (who actually had the most heartbreaking moment of the film).
-Being a documentary about Frontalot’s first tour, much of the movie had concert footage. But, it wasn’t just some cut-and-paste footage editing: the sets were cut with cool diagrams of lyrics, and drawn-over effects, much like that of A Scanner Darkly.
-One of my favorite moments was when Black Lotus, Frontalot’s bassist, went on a nearly 3-hour rant about the rules of Magic The Gathering, which everyone in the band thought was the nerdiest thing ever (and that’s saying a lot).

Seeing as this is a movie review, I should actually review the movie now. In terms of documentaries, this one was pretty good. In comparison to other musical documentaries (Dave Chapelle’s Bloc Party, for instance), it was great at not only looking at the band MC Frontalot, but also the nerd community as a whole. Interviews with fellow nerdcore rappers and nerd celebrities (including Tycho and Gabe) showed more about the actual nerd side of nerdcore, rather than the rapping. Unfortunately, it wasn’t all perfect. I would’ve liked to see more focus on the genre of music, since only 1 band was really talked about. Also, not all of the performances were entertaining. The majority were, but, I would’ve liked to see the art style applied to most of the sets applied to them all.


Frontalot speaks to the PAX crowd.

So, if you’ve heard about this movie, but weren’t sure if you wanted to see it or not, I say it’s definetly worth a few watches. The songs are phenomenal, the nerdiness of it is uber-funny, and the issues it tackles (What does it mean to be a nerd? Is nerdcore racist? Can nerdcore ever be mainstream, and does it want to be?) are exceptionally interesting. Please, get out to any showing you can, because this movie needs more exposure. And be sure to being all your nerd friends.