• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Heavy Metal (1981 animated).

My favorite thing is the Blue Oyster Cult song "Veteran of the Psychic Wars" [penned by Michael Moorcock!] -- there's only a bit of it in the movie but it's a great tune.

Shameless art plug dept: here's a pic I did inspired by the song. :D

flamingjester4fj.gif
 
Fun movie. I suspect it was one of the influences on Buffy the Vampire Slayer as well.

I do like Heavy Metal 2000 as well, although it's definitely a different kind of movie. I've played about half way through Heavy Metal FAKK2....I should finish that sometime.
 
The Fifth Element? In what way?

Harry Cannon = Corbin Dallas in a lot of ways, down-on-his-luck cabbie, beautiful girl on the run falls into his life, even disarming the guy with the photo hat was sort of like Cannon disarming his passengers and throwing the weapons into the cache. In the end, Corbin defeats the Loch-Nar.:)

Plus, the production design of TFE was done by Moebius.
 
Harry Cannon = Corbin Dallas in a lot of ways, down-on-his-luck cabbie, beautiful girl on the run falls into his life, even disarming the guy with the photo hat was sort of like Cannon disarming his passengers and throwing the weapons into the cache. In the end, Corbin defeats the Loch-Nar.:)
Agreed. I'm not saying they ripped off "Heavy metal", but the influences are definitely there. I noticed this when I first saw "Fifth Element" and then my uncle brought it up to me once he saw it.
 
Correct if if I'm wrong, but either the director or the writer for 5th Element was French right? Heavy Metal started out as a French comic so maybe they read it when they were younger and got the idea there.
 
Yes Moebius designed both this movie and Fifth Element, yes David Fincher with Zack Sydner, Guillermo Del Toro, Gore Verbinski and Kevin Eastman are gonna do a multi-animated reboot coming soon. It will have 10 different stories based on the magazine with different animation like 2D, CGI, Clay Animation, Stop Motion, Sketchy and Japanese animation.

And could anyone compare this movie to "Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend"? as in erotic animated fantasy movie wise.
 
One of my favorite films. Hehe, I even named my character in World of Warcraft "Hanoverfist".
Luc Besson was indeed inspired by the original Heavy Metal magazine when he created Fifth Element.
 
One of my favorite films. Hehe, I even named my character in World of Warcraft "Hanoverfist".

Back in my D&D days(many moons ago) the LocNar raised Hell(literally) in my world. And I created a custom player in one of the LIVE basketball games named Cpt. Stern.;)
 
Wow. Haven't thought of this movie in a couple decades at least.

To me, how it comes across is, frankly, dated. It's one of those things that a lot of people treated at the time as though it was significant in some way (kind of the way people older than me feel about, for example, Surrealistic Pillow ;) ), but when you come right down to it, it's just a vehicle for some late-'70s, early '80s rock, propelled by animation that is sometimes interesting and other times blah. Or so it seems to me. Some pretty damn good late-'70s, early '80s rock, but still.

Have I missed its significance (could be) or do those of you who really like it just really dig that particular selection late-'70s, early '80s rock with its mix of interesting and blah animation?
 
Wow. Haven't thought of this movie in a couple decades at least.

To me, how it comes across is, frankly, dated. It's one of those things that a lot of people treated at the time as though it was significant in some way (kind of the way people older than me feel about, for example, Surrealistic Pillow ;) ), but when you come right down to it, it's just a vehicle for some late-'70s, early '80s rock, propelled by animation that is sometimes interesting and other times blah. Or so it seems to me. Some pretty damn good late-'70s, early '80s rock, but still.

Have I missed its significance (could be) or do those of you who really like it just really dig that particular selection late-'70s, early '80s rock with its mix of interesting and blah animation?

Significance?

Name another cartoon pre-1982 that included:

some of the foremost cartoonists of the day doing animation
a host of "names" doing the voice work
a soundtrack with top end bands willingly participating, to the point of actually(in one case) writing a song for the movie?

Even American Pop only really managed to get the music, and far less of it, at that.

And how many of the teens then were influenced by this unique piece of work? Teens that are now running animation studios and such...
 
Wow. Haven't thought of this movie in a couple decades at least.

To me, how it comes across is, frankly, dated. It's one of those things that a lot of people treated at the time as though it was significant in some way (kind of the way people older than me feel about, for example, Surrealistic Pillow ;) ), but when you come right down to it, it's just a vehicle for some late-'70s, early '80s rock, propelled by animation that is sometimes interesting and other times blah. Or so it seems to me. Some pretty damn good late-'70s, early '80s rock, but still.

Have I missed its significance (could be) or do those of you who really like it just really dig that particular selection late-'70s, early '80s rock with its mix of interesting and blah animation?

Significance?

Name another cartoon pre-1982 that included:

some of the foremost cartoonists of the day doing animation
a host of "names" doing the voice work
a soundtrack with top end bands willingly participating, to the point of actually(in one case) writing a song for the movie?

Even American Pop only really managed to get the music, and far less of it, at that.

And how many of the teens then were influenced by this unique piece of work? Teens that are now running animation studios and such...


Look at *WHO* provided voices in Heavy Metal:
John Candy
Annie Potts
Eugene Levy
Harold Ramis
John Vernon
 
Does the film compare to "Akira", "Ghost in The Shell", "Fire and Ice" and other adult toons? and has anyone here even seen "Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend"? it's the infamous Japanese animated erotic horror fantasy movie that is sort of like "Heavy Metal" meets "Hellraiser" and spawned the whole naughty tentacle animation sub-genre.
 
Oh, did I tread on some toes? If so, I'm sorry - really - but the reverence that this movie sometimes seems to get has always puzzled me. Not offended me, but puzzled me. I saw it back in the day (I was in college) and have seen it a time or two since and...to me, it's just one of the movies of my youth.

The music's great (at least from my perspective). And I'm not an expert, but I know some of the animation is considered innovative - though not all, surely.

But how does - and honestly, I'm not being sarcastic - who voiced an animated show make it significant? At least for me, all that's necessary is that the voicing be done well. When I watch something that's animated, I tend to lose myself in the characters as I see them on the screen - not in who's providing the voice. I forget who's providing the voice, actually. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?
 
Oh, did I tread on some toes? If so, I'm sorry - really - but the reverence that this movie sometimes seems to get has always puzzled me. Not offended me, but puzzled me. I saw it back in the day (I was in college) and have seen it a time or two since and...to me, it's just one of the movies of my youth.

The music's great (at least from my perspective). And I'm not an expert, but I know some of the animation is considered innovative - though not all, surely.

But how does - and honestly, I'm not being sarcastic - who voiced an animated show make it significant? At least for me, all that's necessary is that the voicing be done well. When I watch something that's animated, I tend to lose myself in the characters as I see them on the screen - not in who's providing the voice. I forget who's providing the voice, actually. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

Yes, with the idea being that a "name" actor can produce this effect more easily due to experience(not all name actors can do voice work well-but a real talented actor certainly has a good chance of it). Also, voice work for animation was largely ignored by famous talents until this movie. Now you have everyone from Jodi Foster to Tom Hanks doing voiceovers.
Interestingly, some actors have such distinctive voices it can pull you out of the character. However, with practiced delivery a talented actor can breath a "believability" factor into a character.

Heavy Metal
is far from perfect-but in the context of its time it broke a lot of new ground. That's why its held up today-it was a cut above, setting standards instead of meeting them.
 
I pointed out the voicework because that was before those people *were those people*. In other words, it was early in their careers. Like you, I also forget that the actor is providing the voice for the character onscreen.
 
Mistral said:
Yes, with the idea being that a "name" actor can produce this effect more easily due to experience (not all name actors can do voice work well-but a real talented actor certainly has a good chance of it). Also, voice work for animation was largely ignored by famous talents until this movie. Now you have everyone from Jodi Foster to Tom Hanks doing voiceovers.

Yes, but...I don't mean to be argumentative, honestly...but the ones listed weren't really "name" actors at the time Heavy Metal came out, were they? Some of them became so, certainly, but they weren't famous in the way Tom Hanks, Jodi Foster and Mike Myers are now, at least not as far as I can remember. What I'm saying is that even in those days when name actors weren't doing voice-over work (it wasn't until 5-10 years ago that I found out the Beatles didn't voice Yellow Submarine - how disillusioning was that!), the actors associated with Heavy Metal weren't so famous that doing this movie made the average fan stand up and really take notice of who was doing the voice work.

My memory might easily be at fault, but as far as I can recall, the publicity at the time centered around the music, the animation and, to a lesser extent, the stories, with nothing at all about the people doing voices.

I'm not saying the people involved aren't talented...I just don't see them as breaking any ground here.

John Picard said:
I pointed out the voicework because that was before those people *were those people*. In other words, it was early in their careers.

So for you, who did the voicing is an indication of quality? Am I reading you correctly?

Mistral said:
Heavy Metal is far from perfect-but in the context of its time it broke a lot of new ground. That's why its held up today-it was a cut above, setting standards instead of meeting them.

Well, I can accept that. It never did that much for me, but I think that's mainly because I didn't find the stories that compelling, and animation, no matter how innovative, only goes so far.

It does seem to me that most of the people I've heard really praise this movie, though presumably there are notable exceptions, are male...I wonder if that's relevant? 'Cause hot-body alien chicks (wasn't there at least one?) just don't do that much for me...;)
 
Last edited:
Does the film compare to "Akira", "Ghost in The Shell", "Fire and Ice" and other adult toons? and has anyone here even seen "Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend"? it's the infamous Japanese animated erotic horror fantasy movie that is sort of like "Heavy Metal" meets "Hellraiser" and spawned the whole naughty tentacle animation sub-genre.

I can only speak for Akira and Ghost in the Shell out of those, but no not really. Heavy Metal is less profound and doesn't have as solid of a story. If you want to see a comparable Japanese animated film similar in style to Heavy Metal I'd suggest a little film by the name of Mind Game. That's probabally the best comparison I can come up with. :)
 
John Picard said:
I pointed out the voicework because that was before those people *were those people*. In other words, it was early in their careers.

So for you, who did the voicing is an indication of quality? Am I reading you correctly?
No. I'm just saying that these people voiced the movie before their careers broke big. It's just one of those "are you serious???" moments.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top