A review of "Heavy Metal"

Confessions of a Film Junkie: A review of “Heavy Metal”

By: Brian Cotnoir

            “Heavy Metal” is the closest thing that you can get to experiencing an acid trip without actually taking drugs.  The first time I saw this 1980’s animated cluster-fuck of insanity I had to pause it, turn on the lights, and make an observation of my surroundings to make sure that I was, inded, not having an acid trip.  This film is just weird, and I mean that in both a good and bad way.  The film was made in 1981 based off of a magzine of the same title.  There’s really no story-line to the film.  I actually think that they just took 5 separate stories from the magazine and tried to link them together to this glowing green orb known as the Loc-Nar.  The Loc-Nar, like I said, is a small glowing green orb that has traveled through, space, time, and parallel universes.  The Loc-Nar is described as the “sum of all evils” in the film and has powers that can change or destroy the universe, and man, as well as aliens.                                                                                                   
        The film has a great soundtrack featuring songs and peformances by many great bands, such as Sammy Hagar, Black Sabbath, Devo, Cheap Trick, and many more.  The film also features the voice work of actors such as John Candy and Eugene Levy.   The artwork for this film is also very creative; extremely weird, but creative.  This isnt childrens animated movie though, this is an adult movie with scenes of animated graphic nudity, sex, and drug use.  Before I saw this film I never would’ve thought that aliens enjoyed snorting large amounts of drugs or that robots like having sex with humans.                                                                               

        “Heavy Metal” is strange, it’s confusing, and I’m not really sure what all the stories have to do with one another; I still say using the Loc-Nar to relate all the stories is a real stretch. Still, I found the artwork and the music to be enjoyable, but other than that this film sucked.  I’m sure if I took gratuitous amounts of drugs that this film would make a lot more sense, but I for one have no intention of doing that in order to find out.