"Heavy Metal" (1981) was a Canadian-American animated feature film directed toward an adult audience. Directed by Gerald Potterton and produced by Ivan Reitman and Leonard Mogel, it is composed of a series of loosely connected vignettes. These scenes don't have much connection to each other aside from a murky framing device involving some kind of alien force. One of the best scenes is set somewhat incongruously during World War II aboard a USAAF B-17 bomber in the South Pacific.

The B-17 story is tight and surprisingly realistic despite the supernatural theme.

The animators drawing the different scenes basically went where they wanted to go without much regard to an overall plot. The B-17 story, written by Dan O'Bannon of "Alien" fame, apparently was drawn by a World War II veteran who just wanted to tell a supernatural tale from that conflict based on his own experiences - and things branch off in different directions from there.

"Heavy Metal" thus features creativity run wild, which either comports with what you want from an animated feature film or doesn't. Any fan of animation should get a thrill out of it. I think this scene is interesting as a kind of hallucinogenic fantasy memory of World War II. And, it's just plain fun.

2021