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Heavy Metal 2000

Heavy Metal 2000

List Price: $24.95
Your Price: $22.46
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A worthy film
Review: Heavy Metal 2000 is totally worthy of the first Heavy Metal film. In fact, its essence is that of 'Tarna' (with a little bit of 'DEN' thrown in). Heavy Metal 2000 drops the anthology-based approach of its predecessor; instead, opting for a singular story line. This Canadian-German co-production is one simple yarn, based on the novel Melting Pot, by Kevin Eastman, Simon Bisley and Eric Talbot. The story, while not really original, is very imaginative and never boring. It basically conflates elements of George Lucas, Tolkien, Ralph Bakshi and the Bible; by necessity, then, there are unexplained script jumps and gaps.

A marauding, near-immortal space pirate, Tyler (voiced by Michael Ironside) is the villain. The heroine, Julie (Julie Strain), is an adventuress warrior survivor. She shoots an automatic weapon with the best of them. She also looks pretty good in her ripped outfit. But seriously, she's seeking revenge on the nasty dude, Tyler, after he wipes out her family and the colony where they live. Tracking him in the aftermath, Julie follows Tyler into hyper-space, then to a planet far, far away. It is here that an odd Odin (Billy 'White Wedding' Idol) tries to help Julie in her quest to eliminate the demon man whose self-healing powers have made him nearly indestructible. For Julie, time is of the essence. Tyler is close to ruling the universe as an immortal demon.

The animation captures that vintage Heavy Metal look and feel. One major difference between this film and the original is the arrival of CGI rendered animation, which is used intermittently throughout. The mixture is excellent (The one scene in which Julie positions her ship to "hitch" a ride on Tyler's ship as it goes into hyperdrive is simply awesome). Indeed, the $15-million budget look like much more. Interesting enough, the first Heavy Metal film had far more sex and violence (not that there is anything wrong with that).

The soundtrack worked as well. Once again, the soundtrack producers assemble popular artists, however, for better or worse, the singular plot line yields less variety in the musical selections. But the driving Techno/Metal beats from acts such as MDFMK, Zilch, Apartment 26, Coal Chamber, Monster Magnet, Days of the New, Sinisstar, Queens of the Stone Age, Hate Dept., and Bauhaus (a great track) are catchy and are integrated in much the same way as the first film. Despite certain Anime titles, adult feature-length animated films are few and far-between and so it was nice to be able to watch an adult feature-length animated film once again. All in all, Heavy Metal 2000 radiates the spirit of the Heavy Metal magazine itself. It's dark, nasty, bloody, sexy........

The DVD itself is very good. The bright and clear picture is letterboxed at 1.85:1 and is 16x9 enhanced. The 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack is suitably muscular. Included with the other extras are a photo gallery of background art, pencil tests for an action sequence with narration by the director, five animatic comparisons, a trailer, and a four-minute featurette on the voice talent (mainly Strain, Michael Ironside and Billy Idol). The music track is isolated on a separate track for your listening pleasure.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Heavy Metal 2000 brings honor to the magazine
Review: Heavy Metal is a European comic magazine featuring comics that broke every rule of the comic industry. Afterward, a movie was made comprised of some of the best comics from Heavy Metal at the time. Finally, after spending over 10 years in limbo, the animated classic is brought to back in a different form. The movie is based on the comic from the Heavy Metal called FAKK 2. It starts out with a guy named Tyler who gets possesed and is now trying to find the key to imortality. Tyler prooves to be a very cunning villian with such great line as 'What does it take to get laid around here'. But the main star is Julia Strain. The story is some what similar to the last piece from the original Heavy Metal called Taarn. And yes, the famous slow motion bathing scene which made the original so popular is back in this one as well. FAKK 2 relys more on action and violence than the last one relyed on comedy (I still love that one piece called So Beautiful So Dangerous). The animation is what fans should expect from Heavy Metal: CG and full motion animation. In fact, the last villain at the end of the film is competely CG. Some of the moments in the film are really well done: The raid on the planet, the bar brawl, lizard fight and the raid on the caslte. Overall, for fans of the magazine, if you didn't like FAKK 2 or didn't consider it to be the best, you might be dissapointed in this one, but hey, its Heavy Metal. Its all about hard rock and the best animation we have to offer. And if thats what you crave, you have to see this film.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Nowhere near the original 1981 movie !
Review: I bought the dual DVD package with both 1981 and 2000 Heavy Metal movies. The 1981 was an enchantment ! True, free, creative, poetic, powerful, humorous, ... In fact, far and away from "politically correct" that is the rule everywhere now. How refreshing ! In comparison, the 2000 opus is predictable, polished, not funny one bit, boring, tasteless, and in its way, conventionnal. (and we could do without the heavy promotion of Julie Strain ...). The 1981 is up there, with an unique atmosphere, "true" with all its imprefection. The 2000 polished version is down here, has no juice, and never "gets off" ...

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not that Bad...
Review: I d give this a 3 and a half if I would have the option. Lotsa action, adult orientated thru gore and nudity (which is a good thing in this case).

Someone else compared this to Titan AE for adults...I tend to agree, storyline is pretty similar, with the big difference that revenge is a large factor.

Our lovely Julie basically stops at nothing to fulfill her revenge, to bad that the character is poorly developed, all you see is a good looking revenge filled girl being mean to any male she sees.

The villan on the other hand is a little better...the insanity that drives him is made pretty transparent.

The mystical factor of this movie is also well done.

As for the quality...movie has some wonderful animated shots that are nicely drawn and animated..., so thumbs up from me in that department.

Soundtrack IMO is perfect for the movie..and it adds greatly to save the movie from being just another mindless animation.

All in all I liked the film but for some reason I expected more, so if you get this movie expect a good action film, but dont expect any depth at all.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good plot, too short
Review: I found this movie to have an excellent plot. With Tyler finding that key. Taking control of the ship "Cortez." Also taking over the tribe of Shantar to invade the Holyland. However, the movie needs to be at least 40 minutes longer to make the movie better. With only 88 minutes running time on the movie, it felt like the story was running in fast forward. If this film was stretched it could have made the movie much better by putting more detail. The end of the movie is to blunt. They could have work on the ending alot more instead of cutting it off so short.

I rated a 4 star because of the action of the movie. There is a lot of good fighting in the movie and thats what I like in a movie. Could have been a 5 star in my book, if they had made it longer.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: A sad attempt at a sequel
Review: I have been a reader of HM magazine since I was a boy. I was and still am a great fan of the first film. HM2K is a big disappointment for me. Instead of offering some of today's best sci-fi writers an opportunity to contribute a compilation of short stories for the new film, the film makers went with a poorly developed feature length tale that is as predictable and boring as a merry-go-round at the county fare. Despite the aid of modern computers the animation lacks in style and detail as compared with the original film. Even the music is poor this time around! The first film was a successful attempt to translate the style of the magazine to the big screen. HM2K is clearly an attempt to provide the publishers wife (Julie Strain) with star billing in her own film. Trust me on this one......THIS MOVIE BITES!!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Much Better than the original
Review: I have just rented Heavy Metal 2000, and I must admit that I loved it. As a fan of anime, I have seen the original 80's film. And while it is a great film, particularly in the areas of animation it didn't live up to it's potential. Heavy Metal 2000 is brilliantly created, and I found the plot to be exciting. There are quite a few scenes of T&A, as well as animated gore (keeping in spirit with the graphic magazine) so this film is NOT for children. But if you are a fan of smart Adult animation along the same vein as Ralph Bashski, then this you'll love it.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: To quote Hank Hill...Wut in duh(...)?
Review: I just want to say off the bat, that I don't find anything attractive about 6-foot chicks. At ALL. How is that sexy? How? HOW? The ideal woman should be shorter. Cute. Petite. Athletic. You know the deal.

With that said, this movie is a train wreck. A sheer train wreck. I'd rather stab myself in the eye than watch this (...) again. How did this lame(...) story even get the title of "Heavy Metal"? The characters are ugly and unappealing. The plot is a bigger mess than my workbench. The animation is decent- the HAND-DRAWN animation. The computerized stuff is ugly and jarring. It looks totally out of place- especially during the oh-so-confusing ending. The action is stupid and repetive. The dialogue is a joke ("You fools! You FOOLS! HAHAHAHAAHA). Everything is a joke. The people who even enjoyed this movie are sad, pathetic jokes. (...)This "cartoon" isn't even worth using as toilet paper. Buy drugs instead, they're better for you.

The people who made the original 1981 classic should be ashamed.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: May be...
Review: I love the firts Heavy Metal but the second, I don't know.
I see this 2 times and it's not a bad movie but it's not the first Heavy Metal....

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: This Movie Reeked!
Review: I really tried to like this movie since the first Heavy Metal was favorite in my household along with a more obscure Rock & Rule movie which really no one has seen but me and other weird people. Anyway, the plot is almost non-existent like in the Fast and the Furious but I can at least I can that movie without feeling nausated not so for Heavy Metal: FAKK2... Julie Strain looks great as animated "shero" unfortunately she doesn't get naked but only once and that's when she first tries to kill Ironside's voiced antagonists. I've forgotten the character's name because he made that much of an impression on me. Infact I've forgotten all of the character's names and all I can recall is the bloody fight scene towards the end as the bad guy was about to enter this temple and get some water so that he could live forever or some such nonsense and they were using swords and bows and arrows. Yeah, this takes place in the future...okay what's with the swords? Oh and the monk turning out to be the REAL bad guy at the end...Gee I wasn't expecting that.
The first Heavy Metal was more of the rock opera and certainly enough adult situtions to keep even the lowest male life form interested but this sequeal to the classic seems like a rush job like getting a small Healthy Choice Meal after a long day of playing flag football when you were expecting maybe a Swanson's Hungry Man. Don't even this stinker. Though I must admit the little rock dude was cool.


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