Jonna picked up Metallica – Some Kind of Monster last Wednesday and we watched it that night. Boy, did I like this movie.

More than anything else, the movie gave me a different perspective on the St. Anger album. I mentioned previously that this wasn’t one of my favorite albums but after seeing the movie I think its time to revisit it. Actually, more than anything else, it gave me a completely different view of the band than I had previously.

The band was pretty dysfunctional, with a lot of pent up anger towards each other and Hetfields major control issues certainly didn’t help. This dysfunction caused bassist Jason Newsted to eventually leave the band. The movie chronicles the time just after Jason left, when the band decided to hire a therapist to help them through the issues they were having in order to keep the band together.

The movie was rather surreal, as its very weird to see the band formerly called ‘Alchoholica’ by friends sober, serious, and dealing with real human issues. At times, it’s quite uncomfortable to watch, as its like eavesdropping on someones therapy session. Actually, it is eavesdropping on a therapy session.

The thing I liked most about the movie was being able to watch the creative process happening. Its kind of cool to watch what goes into creating an album like St. Anger. It was also kind of cool to watch the band go through the different phases of their relationship, and the human aspects of being in a band the size of Metallica.

I think the movie is worth the time spent watching it. Then again, being in management, I tend to read a lot about team building and things like that.

Seems to me that rather than paying $40,000 a month for Dr. Phil, the band could have just started with The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, as the issues outlined in this book were many of the things that the band was dealing with.

Bottom line is, if you work with teams, this might be a good movie for you to pick up at the rental store. I give it 5 stars.