I saw Heavy Metal when I was a teenager in the summer of 1981, and it remains one of my all-time favorite movies. My most esteemed sequence is the final one, and seeing it is the only reason I now watch the film. After being subjected to all of the gratuitous nudity and sex in the earlier parts of the film, and having watched all of the earlier characters succumb to evil, there was something very striking, even haunting, about Taarna, who spoke not a word and went about her duty with a single-minded, no-nonsense purpose which was quite out of contrast to what had transpired in the earlier stories. I realize that this is an animated film which, in the main, is entertainment for entertainment's sake, and that I am deriving more from the movie than was intended. Nevertheless, Taarna struck a deep chord in me at an elemental level by the conjunction of the concepts of good triumphing over evil, selflessness and self-sacrifice, and the beauty and power of woman which has remained to the present day. The sequence in which she dons her gear in the hideaway, which was rotoscoped, is particularly striking and beautiful.
Review of Heavy Metal
