A
km
tuesday, august 25, 1981
daily nebraskan
page 9
Animated fantasy film gains from new techniques
By Chuck Licurance
Heavy Metal, created by the artists who
produce the magazine of the same name,
contains some of the best feature film
animation that has been done outside of
Walt Disney Studios. It also represents a
new era of complexity for the technique of
rotoscoping (cpverting photographs to
animated cells).
Heavy Metal shuns the dreary simplistic
watercolor washes that filled the frames of
Ralph Bakshi's Fritz the Cat and Wizards,
adult animated features. Heavy Metal's
cells have complicated, layered back
grounds that create an incredible illusion of
depth that animated features seldom have.
Although plot is secondary to technique
(an unwritten rule among, modern anim
ators and filmmakers in general), Heavy
Metal does manage to derive a complex
relationship between various stories from
the pages of Heavy Metal magazine. The
transition piece and focal point for these
seemingly disparate stories is a glowing,
green orb that is "the force of ultimate
evil in the universe." This element manages
to connect many segments, ranging from a
remake of Taxi Driver and The Big Sleep in
twenty-first century New York, to the tale
of an adolescent boy transported into the
past to fill the body of a great warrior and
lover.
At times, the tie between these epi
sodes and our little green orb are a bit
strained and we begin to wonder where the
whole affair is leading, but, of course, it all
ties together (perhaps a bit too nicely) and
the forces of good triumph.
Perhaps the most entertaining and
attention-getting elements in the film are
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Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures
$nm vhj mm o oiiv.
When you order and pick up your
phone at one of our phone centers
you're going to save yourself time and
installation costs. First, we'll process
your request in a few minutes. On the
spot. Then, you simply choose the
telephone you want. And take it with
you when you leave.
JUST VISIT ONE OF THESE LOCATIONS, DURING THESE CONVENIENT HOURS.
8:30am-4:30pm
UNL Student Union, North Lobby
City Campus, August 17-21 and
August 24-25
Nebraska Wesleyan, Student Center,
August 21 and 24
Union College, Gymnasium
August 24
8:30am-5:00pm
LT&T Phone Center Downtown, 15th
& M, Monday-Friday. Also open
Saturday, August 22. 8:30am-5:00pm
9:00am-6:00pm
LT&T Phone Center East,
East Park Plaza,
200 North 66th, Monday-Friday.
Also open Saturdays. 8:30am-5:00pm
So order and pick up your telephone
from one of our convenient carryout
phone centers and save time and
money.
Lincoln
Helping jrn retch
wbomertrjva mst,
whtaawujou vut.
the voices. Harold RamJs, John Candy,
John Flaherty, and other members of the
infamous Second City Improvisation
Comedy Company (also stars of the movie
Stripes) provide the voices for the charact
ers. The vocal performances of these
comedians give the movie some humor and
prevent the fantasy elements from becom
ing unwieldy. John Candy, the over
weight, sadistic misfit in stripes, portrays
the skinny, sweaty-palmed adolescent
turned warrior who must save an Aztec
like culture from the influence of the evil
green ball.
Heavy Metal (the movie) has all the
standard elements that have made the
magazine such a popular fantasysci-fi
magazine. It is quite easy to tell for whom
this movie was made; the soundtrack is
deluged with inane three chord pubescent
rock, offering only Devo and Donald Fagen
for those with more complicated tastes.
But positively, Heavy Metal does realize
the potential of rotoscoping and does de
liver more plot and complexity than was
necessary to claim the audience for which
it aims.
The movie is more ambitious than its
predecessors, Wizards, for instance, and
that has its merits and its detractions. One
feels that perhaps more went into this
movie and, if animated fantasy has become
a genre, then this is certainly the best o
the lot.
13th & P 475-2222 :
1 :05-3 : 1 0-5: 1 5-7 : 20-9:25
i wo noun oi
noastoo thrills."
r u
Dn Dwd
LOST ARK (ED
1:20-3:20-5:20-7:20-9:20
i
The stay of o mon whole
wonted lo meet girl. u
BILL MURJLAY
STRIPES By
71
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Dudley Moor Lut Mintlli
John Gitlgud
Mill
drive -in 488 5353
Open 8:00 Show at dusk
Fall in love
all over again.
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riCIUHES RClf AM
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Buy your textbooks at a bookstore -BUY
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McDonaJdk Fteit:
The Campus Crisis Collection
is
Bring in this ad for a free poster
with purchase of any large sandwich
and medium or large size Coke
ttt ne Coca-Cola Company, famed
1 1 1 purveyors of good taste, commis
stoned Gregory and Timothy Hilde
" brandt, famed illustrators of the
"Lord of the Rings" calendars to produce an
unprecedented series of five posters. Each is
a full-colored, 18" x 24" study of one of the
traumas of college life. Together they com
prise The Campus Crisis Collection.
How, you wonder, can you obtain
these wonders? We're glad we asked. Just go
Trademark
to a participating McDonald's, purchase any
large sandwich and a medium or large size
Coke, and you will be presented with an
entry in the collection "Home Game,"
"Freshman Counseling, Chemistry 101,"
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We're confident you will be pleased
with your Campus Crisis posters. If you're
not, write to the Hildebrandt brothers. You'll
still enjoy the artfulness of your McDonald's
sandwich and Coke.
offer good at participating
McDonald s restaurants
DOWNTOWN
14th & O Street
27th & Vine
C 147 McDMuld CuipurK!i
NruSftHvran Hn E,th" ' B,g Qu"tw PounJw
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lul August 24 August 30. 1981
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