Er, “weird-assed Seventies ANIMATED movie,” that is…
Otherwise, it woulda been “The Rocky Horror Picture Show…”
I, too, immediately thought of this film when I read the title. Interesting flick, mainly for the style and the throwaway bits (I like the caged creature that lures the little birdlike things with its branch-like nose, then grabs them, shakes them up, and throws them to the ground. Then it laughs, evilly. It makes absolutely no evolutionary sense, but what in this movie does?)
Years later, a lot of the people resposible for this made another animated sf film, Light Years. The english-language version had a script by Isaac Asimov(!!!)
I thought it would be about The Point .
So that movie DID exist!
La Planete Sauvage, what a movie! I love the completely calm, dispassionate voices dubbed for the giant blue overlords.
I might as well add that the soundtrack is an amazing piece of creeped out funk scored by Alain Goraguer. It’s one of the best seventies soundtracks I’ve ever heard, and matches the feel of the film perfectly.
It’s also now a fairly rare collector’s item, fetching around $100 for the original Pathe LP, but there’s a CD reissue out now. It’s worth seeking out.
I’m glad I wasn’t the only one.
Is Fantastic Planet the one with a lot of bizarre creatures like a guy (I think he’s wise) who’s whole body is basically his head? A head with legs? I also remember naked women. It’s all so hazy…
That’s where I saw it first as well. Freakish but hypnotic.
My other nominee for strange 70’s (semi-)animated film is Allegro non troppo, an Italian parody of Fantasia. Fun stuff.
Since this is a thread about obscure animation flicks…can anyone name this one?
In the UK, when Channel 4 was first introduced, in the early eighties, they showed this foriegn animated movie. It told the story of Monkey’s Journey to the West. It was absolutely beautiful, with animation inspired by classic Chinese paintings. That’s the way I remember it, mind you I was only 11 or so.
I don’t know if this is the one you had in mind, but it’s a cartoon from my youth based on the Chinese myth of Monkey. Its original title is apparently Saiyu-ki, but I saw it dubbed into American (with the voice of Franki Avalon!) as Alakazam the Great!. It was years before I learned this was a version of a classic Chinese tale:
According to the IMDB, this version of the tale ran on Channel 4. Maybe it’s your baby:
Another one who knew it…
I bought this movie a couple of years ago, telling the kids all the way home what a weird great movie it was. They watched it that night, and gave me strange looks for the next week.
Apparently they did not understand the finer points and the inate charm of the film. Cretins…
Now that, is one great show, but not the one I’m looking for. When I was a wee ouisey, they showed it on BBC2, but the lucky viewers in the UK get to see it now on Channel 4, dammit.
No, that’s Light Years, mentioned above. Very similar style.
Not to crap in a love-fest thread, but am I the only person out there who thought this movie was really, really bad? Aside from Lyllyan’s clearly precocious and insightful children, I mean?
One thing about F.P. that I always found strangely evocative is the drawing style. Very pastel-like, without the bold borders and high contrast most animations use. I seem to recall it was a very popular illustration method back in the 70s.
While it can be engaging, Fantastic Planet is, at best, an acquired taste, I think. I kinda dig it, but generally, when I expose someone to it for the first time, I get reactions like Lyllyan mentioned earlier. Someone once said, in another thread on this flick, that it was “science fiction by someone who’s never seen science fiction before.”
Weird about covers it. But Cinema de Merde is my thing.
Usually, (in my limited experience on these boards, at least) with a thread title like this one, it’s Fantastic Planet, followed by Light Years, and then Wizards.
Yeah, I guessed it from the thread title, too. 
Pretty sure that was me, actually.
No. I didn’t care for it a bit.
My first guess on reading the thread title was ‘Twice Upon A Time’, but it turns out that was made in 1983.
I don’t mean to hijack, but there’s this other 70’s or 80’s animated film about whales, perhaps pollution was affecting them. I sort of remember a evil guy with a black mustache. It was very disturbing to me as a child, but I don’t think it was meant to be be. I think it was done in a style of animation similar to the Beatles Yellow Submarine. I would really like to know what the name of this was and figure out why it was so disturbing to me.