Heavy Metal

An EEE-vil green orb comes to Earth and traps a young girl in her house in order to tell her a series of loosely connected stories about itself.

Alien/Henchman (Harvey Atkin)
Boy (Thor Bishopric)
Hanover Fiste/Dr Anrak (Rodger Bumpass)
Katherine (Jackie Burroughs)
Desk Sergeant/Dan/Den/Robot (John Candy)
Councilman (Ned Conlon)
Barbarian (Len Doncheff)
Woman Reporter (Patty Dworkin)
Lawyer/General (Joe Flaherty)
Grimaldi/Co-Pilot/Barbarian (Don Francks)
Councilman (Joseph Golland)
Councilman (Charles Jolliffe)
Regolian (Douglas Kenney)
Ard (Martin Lavut)
Sternn/Male Reporter/Edsel (Eugene Levy)
Whore/Queen (Marilyn Lightstone)
Elder (Mavor Moore)
Senator (Warren Munson)
Gloria (Alice Playten)
Zeke (Harold Ramis)
Girl/Satellite (Susan Roman)
Harry Canyon (Richard Romanus)
Nort/Taarak (August Schellenberg)
Girl (Caroline Semple)
Bartender (Cedric Smith)
Pilot/Barbarian (George Touliatos)
Prosecutor (John Vernon)
Barbarian Leader (Vlasta Vrana)
Rudnick (Al Waxman)
Navigator/Barbarian (Zal Yanovsky)

Year: 1981
Censorship Rating: R (due to nudity, horror, drug use, adult themes and violence)

"Heavy Metal" is a bit of an odd duck. It is an anthology, with several different sub-stories being linked by a framing device ie the evil green orb known as the Loc Nar. The quality of each story (in terms of both animation and narrative) can vary quite a bit between segments, making Heavy Metal a mixed bag. In order to look at it fairly, each section of the anthology will be separated out.

For those who don'w know, the "Heavy Metal" movie is based on a magazine of the same name that specialises in "mature" comics (ie with violence and swearing and nudity). Although it once stood out alone as the only mainstream comic source to find this type of material, arguably in recent years it has become less unique as other comic book publishers have started to release "mature" titles. That said, the magazine is a bit of an institution in terms of what it stands for and what it contains.

Opening / Grimaldi: A green orb floats past the Heavy Metal logo while thunder crashes somewhere in space. [And if you have an issue with thunder crashing in space, stop here and go to bed - things are going to get a lot worse.]

A space shuttle opens its pod bay doors to drop a car off, all to the strains of a guitar. The astronaut then "drives" his car from space to his house [told you!]. Arriving, he gets something a container out of his car's trunk and goes inside.

He is greeted by a girl. "What did you bring me?" she says. The astronaut isn't peturbed by her rudeness [no hello, no how-are-you, etc] and says "You'll see". Which she does, when he opens the container and the green orb flies out, dissolving him on the way. The orb traps the girl, saying, "Do not try to escape. You are in my control. Look at me. I am the sum of all evils. Look carefully. My power infests all time, all galaxies, all dimensions" [blah blah blah. Everything this orb says is pure cliche, taken straight from Evil for Dummies Chapter 4: How to Sound Like a Villain. For the source of all evil, the orb really needs a better speechwriter].

[Comment: This section is just an extended music video. I found myself wishing it would hurry up, but it never did.]

Harry Canyon: At an execavation somewhere, a human archeologist oversees the digging by some alien creatures and a huge triple-headed execavator [so much for protecting the artefacts]. They uncover a green orb, who dissolves an alien.

Shift to a dirty, decadent city where life is cheap and no-one cares [and if you'd guessed the city is New York, give yourself a pat on the back]. Narration is provided by the focus of the story - Harry Canyon, a cab driver. You can tell he's seen it all by the way he sounds bored with every line he delivers. A newspaper shows that the archeologist is displaying something in the city museum.

A punk who gets in the cab tries to mug Harry, who in turn disintegrates him with a secret laser activated by a hidden switch. [We also know this is the future since the UN Building is apparently now low-rent housing.]

At the museum, some toughs kill the archeologist and chase his attractive, busty daughter. She steps in front of Harry's cab and Harry, against his better judgement, lets her in. They escape the goons. She gasps out her story then passes out, letting the audience see up her skirt. Classy!

[I'll also point out that at no point does this woman get a name, which I thought was fairly demeaning. How hard is it to give a character a name, especially one that gets quite a bit of dialogue and plays a big part of this section? As such, I shall christian her Belle.]

Harry tries to take Belle to the cops, but they are disinterested and now charge a lot of money to investigate any crimes. So Harry takes Belle home instead where she wakes up and talks about the Loc Nar - its history, how the bad guys want it but that it is well hidden. An important point [to me, anyway] was that people appear to die around it all the time. [Personally, that would be a good reason to stay out away, but then again I'm not a cabbie-who's-seen-it-all.] Harry goes to bed [showing a much flatter stomach than you'd believe by the shape of his shirt] and tells Belle to sleep on the couch. Belle has other ideas. Gratuitousness ahoy [and all I can say is that some things have definitely changed since early 80's in terms of what is perceived as "attractive"]!

The cops wake Harry looking for Belle. She's disappeared. As soon as Harry gets into his cab, a goon jumps him. The goon's leader, Rudnick, appears and talks to Harry about wanting the Loc Nar.

On the road, Harry is trailed by the goons but gets a robohovertelegram that Belle wants to meet him at the Statue of Liberty. At this point we learn that cabs of the future will be equipped with Jet Drive mode and rear guns. Once at the statue Belle reveals the Loc Nar (in protective casing) and indicates she is going to sell it to Rudnick. Belle acts like a complete simp, so Harry agrees to help her for "50% of the take".

On a bridge, Belle and Rudnick exchange items. Harry and Belle drive away safely. Rudnick takes the Loc Nar out of its case and is dissolved by it. Belle then tries to double-cross Harry but is disintergrated by his secret laser [that destroys her clothes first. Classy!]. Harry drives off to resume his life.

[Interlude: The Loc Nar barely features in this and appears pretty wussy for the source of all evil. Sure, dissolving people isn't something to sniff at, but Harry also disintergrated two people as well and he's just a cab driver. The narrative itself is okay, but it's a very obvious noir story, and since we all know how things go down in noir stories (particularly when femme fatales get involved) it holds no surprises at all. Well, maybe one surprise...]

Back at the house, the Loc Nar is gloating over its rather-dull story. Apparently the orb has chosen to corner the girl because she "possesses powers [she] does not yet understand". [Still talking in cliches, hey Loc Nar?]

Den: A nerd (voiced by John Candy) finds a smooth green spherical rock [guess who?] and adds it to his rock collection. Then, during the nerd's experiment with lightning that he conducts inside his room [or course], the Loc Nar causes something to go wrong and the nerd is sucked into another dimension. We know that this is a fantasy dimension because our young white nerd is transformed into a muscular handsome black man. He arrives at a temple where a ritual involving lots of female nudity is being conducted. One naked woman is thrown into a pool of water as sacrifice. Den (as the ex-nerd is named) dives in after her.

Den saves the girl (who reveals her name as Katherine and that she is also from Earth), but they are captured shortly after by some mutants (of the humanoid animal type, not the X-men). Den is taken in front of Ard, leader of these mutants. Ard is also a human, but one with the personality of an amateur theature Caligula. Den tries to escape, but (after beating up some guards) finds out that Ard has the ability to regenerate. Ard offers Den a deal - get the Queen's Loc Nar sceptre and Ard will free Katherine from a glass block that she has been imprisoned in.

Den sets off to the Queen's Palace with Gnarl, Ard's "bravest warrior" [who looks like a Planet of the Apes reject] and some miscellaneous mutants. They take a secret tunnel under the Palace that Gnarl knows about but run into the requisite tunnel monster, who snacks on a few of those miscellaneous mutants [good thing they came along]. Escaping the tunnels, they enter the Queen's chamber, but it's a trap! Den faces certain death until the Queen indicates "she has something better in mind". [This part was actually funny - one of the Queen's mutants goes, "Jeez! Not again! This always happens!", which makes you wonder about how many nerds have been teleported to this land. Also, watch the Queen's robes change colour from purple to red.]

During the "something better" part, the Loc Nar sceptre goes missing, with the Queen going from pillow talk with Den to "off with his head!". Den manages to escape, only to find Ard trying to sacrifice a much blonder Katherine in the same ritual [that's two times in same sacrificial ritual in the same day for Katherine! Don't you hate it when that happens?]. Den saves Katherine (again). Ard throws a bit of a hissy fit at being defeated, before the Queen shows up and they both squabble like little children. Their respective mutants fight it out too [and here more evidence of it being a fantasy world can be seen, with guns having no advantage over melee weapons]. Den uses a variation on Ben Franklin's kite experiment to cause Ard and the Queen to be struck by lightning, causing them to vanish. Den forsakes ruling over the land (and the mutants) with the Loc Nar, instead choosing to fly away into the sunset with Katherine on the back of a giant dragonfly.

[Interlude: Okay, here the Loc Nar told a story where it failed to do anything even remotely evil and was beaten by the hero who wasn't even really trying. As a source of all evil, the Loc Nar really sucks.]

The Loc Nar makes some excuses for what happened with Den, then flies up to a space station. Said source of all evil is now about the size of a gumball and is found by a large-chinned man.

Sternn: Captain Lincoln F. Sternn is on trial for doing a lot of bad things - he's facing a lot of charges and a courtroom full of angry people / mutants / aliens. Sternn pleads not guilty to the charges, which doesn't make Charlie, his lawyer, very happy since Sternn is most certainly guilty [but since when does having more billable hours make lawyers unhappy?]. Sternn tells Charlie that he's "got an angle".

First witness called for the defence is Hanover Fist. [Just to make sure we get that cracking joke, his name is repeated about five times by bailiffs. Oh, my sides.] Hanover is the big-chinned guy who picked up the Loc Nar. On the stand Hanover starts by saying some good things about Sternn, but as he plays with the Loc Nar his voice changes and he starts providing examples of Sternn's misdeeds. His testimony ends with Hanover literally hulking out (minus the green skin-part). Sternn tries to talk his way out of getting smashed, but ends up being saved from certain death by his loyal flying cyclopic egg [hey, it's what happens].

We get a chase around the space station, with destruction and violence occurring as Sternn tries to stay out of Hanover's fist [...sorry...]. Sternn finally gets cornered by Hanover, only to pay him off - turns out that Hanover was Sternn's angle. Hanover is then double-crossed by Sternn, who pulls a lever that opens a trapdoor and ejects Hanover into space.

[Interlude: Ignoring the stupidity of a trapdoor in a space station that ejects someone into space (and it is a very, very stupid thing if you pause to think about it) I am again left wondering what part the Loc Nar really played in this. Sternn had Hanover as his "angle" - he obviously knows what Hanover can do. Unless Hanover finds the Loc Nar every time he needs to hulk out, he doesn't need it at all. Since I doubt the Loc Nar makes himself available every time Hanover wants him (because why would the source of all evil be that accommodating?) we see that, yet again, the Loc Nar is irrelevant in one of its own stories.

If this is the source of all evil, then we can sleep safely in our beds, knowing that the worst we have to face is being bored to death by it.]

B-17: Remnants of Hanover (still clutching the Loc Nar) rain down onto the Earth. We cross to a B-17 [a WWII bomber for those who don't know] that is under heavy fire. It's crew is dying all over the place. Only the two pilots survive the bombing run. Once they are out of the anti-aircraft fire, one of the pilots goes back to look on the rest of the crew and finds them all messily dead. He sees a glowing green light coming at them from behind the B-17.

The Loc Nar flies in and brings back all the dead crew as creepy, hungry-for-flesh zombies. Our investigative pilot gets eaten, while our remaining pilot bails out from the cockpit when he realises what is going on. Unfortunately, he parachutes away from a B-17 of the Dead and onto an Island of the Dead - the island he lands on is full of downed war planes with accompanying zombie residents.

[Interlude: Finally, the Loc Nar does something vaguely evil. Sure, it's not that great of an evil (c'mon - every mad scientist / voodoo witch doctor / teenager with a book of forbidden magic worth their salt can raise the dead) but it's a standout given the previous stories. Plus the story is short and to the point. Well done Loc Nar!]

The Loc Nar crows his victory in the B-17, saying that the "paltry armies of the universe are but playthings to me". [If you were wondering if the source of all evil was still speaking in cliches from Evil for Dummies, I guess that answers your question.]

So Beautiful and So Dangerous: We look at a green screen of the Pentagon from overhead, which then turns into the real Pentagon. An official-looking man gets out of a car and is immediately hassled by reporters. The man is Dr Anrak and his alleged genius [alleged because we'll never see any indication of it] has been called in because apparently mutants have been spotted in Arizona.

Dr Anrak enters a meeting of military and political stereotypes. They are all wondering what is going on and if aliens are somehow involved. While Dr Anrak goes on about how aliens don't exist and that was is happening is a natural abberation, a large alien spacecraft hovers over the Pentagon. Anrak sees a glowing green brooch on the beautiful female stenographer's blouse and either overcome with lust or mutating [it isn't made clear and frankly doesn't matter] he leaps across the table and starts to grapple with her. Meanwhile the spacecraft drills a hole in the roof of the Pentagon and sucks both Anrak and the stenographer onto the ship. Unfortunately for Anrak apparently they have things turned up a little high because he crashes at the bottom of the tube and is revealed (as he breaks) to be a robot. The stenographer's landing is gentler.

The stenographer takes being abducted by aliens very, very well. [Me, I would have been at least surprised or something for a little while. She just worries about her clothes and getting to her parents' house for dinner.]

[Interlude: I'm not going to even bother talking about this bit. Past this bit we just have various forms of gratuitousness and 1980's komedy (including some pretty lame Jewish jokes). What happens can be summed up by saying "The space ship flies to a space station" and everything else that happens is just time-wasting detail.

As for the Loc Nar ... well, after its high point in B-17 the best it can do here is act as a brooch and maybe - just maybe - make a scientist lust after a beautiful woman. Maybe it is somehow involved with causing the mutants in Arizona, but after the set-up this issue is never mentioned again. Yet again: the source of all evil just plain sucks.]

The Loc Nar tells the little girl that its stories are nearly at an end [yay!]. Apparently the girl is "a future threat that could destroy" the Loc Nar and with her death the Loc Nar "breaks the chain for all time". [Which begs the question - why didn't he just kill her? I know that villains like to monologue, but the Loc Nar takes the grand prize for yakking on when it should be doing something. Especially given this next bit...]

Taarna: The Loc Nar crashes into a mountain on another fantasy world. When people go to investigate the crash site, the Loc Nar causes green slime to erupt from the mountain. This slime covers the people [who don't try to do anything rash like, I don't know, run away] and turns them green and evil [and also gives the boss a stupid helmet to wear].

The Greens attack and start to slaughter a peaceful city [insert your own environmentalist joke here]. We see the City Elders bicker about what to do. The Head Elder decides against fighting back because they "are statesmen and scientists". Instead, they decide to summon the warrior race (which only has one member left - Taarna) to help them [great idea brainiacs, except for the fact your people are already being slaughtered and the enemy is inside the walls. How about fighing back until Taarna gets there to save you? How about that?]. They summon Taarna "from within", which involves shutting their eyes and chanting her name. Unfortunately, because no-one thought to bar the doors to the city council [during an attack on said city - idiots!] the bad guys get in.

Cut to an open landscape. What looks to be the offspring of a pteradon and a plucked chicken carries a rider on a scenic tour of the country. When it lands, the rider drops her cloak to reveal herself as 1) Taarna and 2) naked [that must be a mighty warm cloak, because flying naked would be one chilly thing to do. Or perhaps no-one gets cold in this world...]. She takes a swim across a lake to the central shrine [which doesn't ruin her make-up] to get dressed in her armoured bikini.

[It should be noted here that the narrative grinds to a halt while we watch Taarna get dressed. Everything is lingered over and Taarna certainly doesn't seem to be rushing. Boy, it's a good thing she wasn't summoned to help save a city from an immediate emergency or something like that...]

Dressed, Taaran picks up a gold sword that rises from the floor. Holding the sword above her head, she gets a surrounded by a Masters-of-the-Universe-style blue lightning glow.

Arriving at the city, she finds everyone has been slaughtered. She does find a clue - one of the bad guys left a medallion that bears a symbol behind.

Taarna then flies straight to a bar where she sees some EEE-vil bat mounts that bear the same symbol. Going in, she ignores the Green guy beating someone up outside. The evil Green guys are inside, doing what evil people in bars do [and the band playing is Devo, if you were wondering]. Taarna gets a drink from the bartender while the bad guys are attracted to her half-nakedness. They start hitting on her. She hits back, but with a beer stein, not words. The whole bar grinds to a halt.

[Okay, this bit was just stupid. We have just seen the evil Green guys beat up several people and no-one seems to care. But the second a woman hits a man, jaws start hitting the floor. The other thing that bothers me is that Taarna doesn't speak. I'm sure that's meant to make her look like a woman-of-action or something, but in reality just reduces her to personality-less eye candy. Anyway...]

The Greens attempt to attack Taarna, but she beheads them all [didn't they see the large gold sword on her side?]. Taarna then gets the bad guys' location from the barkeeper.

One the way there, Taarna and her flying mount end up in a net strung up by the Greens. A minion sees that Taarna has the special marking of a Taarakian warrior (ie the warrior race) and runs up to tell the Green Boss. Green Boss thanks the minion for his work in the usual evil boss way ie he almost strangles him to death.

Green Boss gloats over capturing Taarna (after having her stripped naked, of course) and gives her a whipping. She wakes up in a Pit of Death [looking less like someone who has just been tortured and more like someone who had a bit too much to drink the night before]. For some reason, someone drops Taarna's armoured bikini right next to her. Meanwhile, her plucked chicken mount escapes from its execution and saves her. EEE-vil Green Boss tells his minions "I want her dead!" [so why didn't you do it before, when you had her captured, or just had her thrown properly into the Pit of Death? I tell you, incompetence comes from the top down...] and the chase is on. Taarna gets closer to the glowing green mountain, but her mount is shot down.

Green Boss fights Taarna in melee combat. She's got her gold sword, he's got a circular saw attachment on his arm. Green Boss initially gets the best of her [cutting some of her clothes off in the process - classy!] and it looks like Taarna is done for after a fairly half-hearted fight. However, she is saved by her mount (again). With the Green Boss injured, Taarna turns his own weapon against him, then punches through his face [ouchie!]. She and the mount then fly above the supersized Loc Nar. The Loc Nar says, "You can not destroy me!" which instantaneously means Taarna can destroy the Loc Nar [vocal reversal rule in action, folks - if you don't want something to happen, don't say it out loud]. Turning into being of light, she flies into the Loc Nar and [surprise surprise] destroys it.

[Interlude: In a dimension where the source of all evil is such a pantywaist, it stands to reason that the champion of good would be pretty iffy as well. Let's see - Taarna dawdles on her way to save the town by taking a long swim and dressing slowly, beheads three evil but unarmed villains in a bar fight and is no match at all for the Green Boss. What a champion. In actuality, it is her mount that is the true hero of this story - it saves Taarna twice and takes a lot more punishment than she does. Plus it has more dialogue and more personality. Go, you big flying plucked chicken, go!]

[And for the second time, the Loc Nar has told a story where it lost.]

Back in the house, the Loc Nar starts to crumble. The girl escapes the house before it blows up. Outside she finds her own plucked chicken mount and flies off. The girl's hair goes grey (like Taarna's) and we can see that she has the Taarakian mark. The narrator mumbles something about evil being defeated and destiny and blah blah blah - it is as full of cliches as anything the Loc Nar ever said. [It's nice to know good and evil can be just as pompous.]

"Heavy Metal" has a big issue with the use of the framing device. Having the evil green orb tell stories about its impact (or lack thereof) on other dimensions (or wherever) is kind of like being bailed up by that boring uncle you have who precedes to tell you, in-depth, stories that somehow involve him (and probably aren't true). It's fun to watch to girl he's cornered try to escape not because she's terrified of its evil, but because she just wants to get away from the next dull story. "Sure, Uncle Loc Nar, it was great to hear that story you barely featured in, but I think my mother is calling me..."

It is a very weak idea and serves as a very disjointed mechanism between the stories (especially where the preceding story has the green orb fail to make the world more EEEE-vil). It would have been more interesting if the green orb had been dumped and the individual stories had been allowed to flow as separate pieces of work. The original choice of framing device was a round-a-bout, but I don't know if it would have worked better than the green orb.

Although the background detail the exists in some sections of "Heavy Metal" is fantastic, to my anime-soaked eyes everything just moves s-o s-l-o-w-ly during the "action" sequences that it actively destroys interest in what's going on. Just look at Taarna's sword action during her bit - she takes so long to swing you'll wonder why the bad guys just don't dodge the telegraphed blow.

In my opinion, "Heavy Metal"'s biggest problem is that it has dated. Compared to animation today, it just doesn't stand up, especially compared to the other "mature" offerings that can be found in anime. For it's time it was revolutionary, and I'm sure that people who saw it when it was originally released were shocked and / or thrilled by it. Today's audience would have seen it all before and probably done better too.

Other problems of Heavy Metal include:

• The wide variation of quality between the individual stories. Most of the stories are passable (although a little dated now) but given the number of different sections and styles I'm sure that every individual will find ones they enjoy watching alongside sections that just drag.

• The "comedy" (or should that be komedy?) through most of Heavy Metal is just plain unfunny. Occasionally clever, for the most part it was just dull (or worse) to sit through.

• I could say that gratuitousness was a flaw of Heavy Metal, but that's what Heavy Metal is all about, right?

After writing this review, I was contacted by a few people who commented on how I'd ignored the music of "Heavy Metal". To these people, it was the music that made "Heavy Metal" worth watching.

I did skip mentioning the music, but probably because it's not to my tastes. Although the music I've heard from Devo and recognised the names of other groups involved, I really wasn't grabbed by the music. For those of you who are, just go out and buy the soundtrack to "Heavy Metal" - it probably isn't worth wasting your time watching the movie simply to hear your favourite tunes.

"Heavy Metal" is made up of stories taken from the pages of the Heavy Metal magazine, with one or two original contributions. From that perspective, it is very faithful to its source. The use of the Loc Nar is obviously a conceit developed especially for the movie.

I didn't dislike Heavy Metal, but I didn't exactly enjoy it either. Although it was no doubt an achievement for its time, it has just dated badly, especially since the introduction of anime to a wider audience.

Were I to start pointing out the plot problems with Heavy Metal's parts, I'd never stop. However, the Loc Nar certainly deserves two points all on its own, while the (often bland) gratuitousness gets it another.

Date of review: 15 February 2005