It’s all about the talent. Tell me that Paramount is developing a new Heavy Metal movie under the aegis of Kevin Eastman, and it’s shruggin’ time. Replace “aegis of Kevin Eastman” with “spearheaded by David Fincher”, however, and you’ve got my interest. Big time.
Regardless of the pedigree, there’s the idea of David Fincher making a kinky animated movie, which is downright tumescent with all kinds of prurient possibilities. Yeah, yeah… he’s a versatile, well-read artist capable of restraint. Whatever. The fucker’s got a dirty mind. It doesn’t matter what he does. It doesn’t matter who’s around. He’s just gonna lay it down.
Hopefully, working alongside Fincher will raise the games of Eastman (the American publisher of Heavy Metal) and Tim Miller (head of Blur Studios, which will handle the animation chores on the film). According to Variety, the anthology film will consist of eight or nine vignettes. This means there are up to six slots open. Though it sounds like Blur will dominate the aesthetic, I would love to see Fincher change up styles and incorporate the disparate sensibilities of folks like Henry Selick, Chris Cunningham, Don Hertzfeldt, Michel Gondry and, hell, maybe even Terry Gilliam. Letting artists of this caliber create some truly dangerous, sexually explicit animation could only be a good thing for our culture (Hertzfeldt especially, since he’s the guy who ruined my brain with 101 Dalmatians tentacle porn; to be clear, he didn’t draw it, but he did convince me to go looking for it).
There’s no word on what stories Fincher, Eastman and Miller are considering, nor is there a speculative release date. All we know is that this will be an R-rated movie. Make that an NC-17, and we’re there.