Back in the 1980’s a wonderful animated film came out by the name of Light Years. It didn’t get that much attention but is revered by many today animation experts and sci-fi geeks to this day. It combined the great minds of French animator, Rene Laloux and Isaac Asimov into a visually stunning peace of art that is more relevant today than it was 2o+ years ago.
The movie is wrapped around a riddle that the main character, Sylvain, must answer, “In a thousand years, Gandahar was destroyed, and and all its people massacred. A thousand years ago, Gandahar will be saved, and what can’t be avoided will be.”
The plot is very intense and deals with relevant topics such as war vs. pacifism, the dangers of unchecked scientific experiments and the theory of time travel in relevance to the human mind and soul. It’s stunningly beautiful in artistic expression and just as well written.
The original version was directed by René Laloux, and was based on Jean-Pierre Andrevon‘s novel Les Hommes-machines contre Gandahar (The Machine-Men versus Gandahar). An English version of the epic science fiction film was produced by Harvey Weinstein, and renowned science-fiction legend Isaac Asimov made the revision of the translation from French to English.
It boasts a very impressive cast of voice actors in the American version. Among the actors were, Glenn Close, Jennifer Grey, Terrence Mann, Penn and Teller, John Shea, Bridget Fonda, David Johansen, Earle Hyman, Earl Hammond and Christopher Plummer. Plummer plays the villain in the film with cunning excellence.
It has has beautifully drawn women with a slight tint of blue/purple skin color that are naked for most of the film. It’s a masterpeice that will live on for years. It is well known for it’s strange landscapes yet vaguely familiar creatures as well as menacing “men of metal”. The art is well done and if you like science fiction, you’re going to love this film.
Now if we could only get them to release it on DVD!
But until then, we have Youtube, please see below, the 8 part movie of LIGHT YEARS…
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