Rating: 
Summary: Not because it's offensive...
Review: Like Bakshi's other works (except for Lord of the Rings, which I happen to like) it is well-animated and the rest is terrible. The fact that I say this has nothing to do with the fact that it is offensive, and I get irritated when reviewers imply that the "mainstream/establishment" critics just can't handle Bakshi's subversive filmaking.
Rating: 
Summary: Another Classic Bakshi
Review: Like Fritz the Cat and Bakshi's other works, Heavy Traffic moves into city life to show the darker side of America. Bakshi once said in an interview: "If Disney was going to animate for the middle class, I was going to animate for the guy on the street." Heavy Traffic is Bakshi accomplishing that.The film isn't just a social statement though, it also has a lot of creativity behind that. It opens with the live action version of our main character Michael playing pinball. Michael is a cartoonist, and as he asks questions to himself he slowly dives into his world...a world similar to the one he lives in now, but a caricature of themselves. Michael deals with his crazy mother, corrupt father, a relationship with a girl, and trying to get a job - a hard task as his ideas involve events such as God getting shot in the face with a shotgun. If you were offended or put off by the brashness of "Fritz the Cat" then you should give Heavy Traffic a try. The nudity and sex is still there, but on a toned down scale. The social satire and goofy humor is still there, and that just makes it all the more a good film. Bakshi considered this one of the top three best films he did (next to Fritz and Streetfight). It is deservedly so.
Rating:
Summary: Another Classic Bakshi
Review: Like Fritz the Cat and Bakshi's other works, Heavy Traffic moves into city life to show the darker side of America. Bakshi once said in an interview: "If Disney was going to animate for the middle class, I was going to animate for the guy on the street." Heavy Traffic is Bakshi accomplishing that. The film isn't just a social statement though, it also has a lot of creativity behind that. It opens with the live action version of our main character Michael playing pinball. Michael is a cartoonist, and as he asks questions to himself he slowly dives into his world...a world similar to the one he lives in now, but a caricature of themselves. Michael deals with his crazy mother, corrupt father, a relationship with a girl, and trying to get a job - a hard task as his ideas involve events such as God getting shot in the face with a shotgun. If you were offended or put off by the brashness of "Fritz the Cat" then you should give Heavy Traffic a try. The nudity and sex is still there, but on a toned down scale. The social satire and goofy humor is still there, and that just makes it all the more a good film. Bakshi considered this one of the top three best films he did (next to Fritz and Streetfight). It is deservedly so.
Rating: 
Summary: the world is a vampire
Review: No level of animation can make up for the depravity of spirit in this film. Yes -- the world is a harsh reality. BUT - the heart is an impenetrable redemption. Please take notice. This movie has no redemption. This movie has no heart. Pitiful. Pathetic. Ugly. Stupid. With an occasional glimpse of artistic merit. and the real life scenes are some of the most uncomfortable acting i've seen to date. watcher beware!
Rating:
Summary: the world is a vampire
Review: No level of animation can make up for the depravity of spirit in this film. Yes -- the world is a harsh reality. BUT - the heart is an impenetrable redemption. Please take notice. This movie has no redemption. This movie has no heart. Pitiful. Pathetic. Ugly. Stupid. With an occasional glimpse of artistic merit. and the real life scenes are some of the most uncomfortable acting i've seen to date. watcher beware!
Rating:
Summary: Possibly Bakshi's best film
Review: Not my favourite Bakshi movie, mind you. That spot will always be reserved for 'Wizards', regardless of how hard the critics panned it (generally the same critics who thought the awful 'Fire and Ice' was great.) In any event, Heavy Traffic is a more satisfying movie than Fritz the Cat, with which it probably has more in common than any other Bakshi movie. Sure you can always pick holes in Ralph Bakshi's films, but what about the strong points: his gorgeous use of dialogue. The actors sound completely uncoached and spontaneous. I've always thought the dialogue in Bakshi's films up to Wizards was masterful. I could listen to it with the picture turned off. Heavy Traffic is probably autobiographical in part. At least, if it isn't, Ralph sure went out of his way to make it seem that way. Protagonist is a young cartoonist... The supporting cast are almost all low-life of one sort or another; losers, psycopaths, bigots, masochistic transvestites, dysfunctional parents, alcoholics, amputees, or a combination of the above. And for the most part they're repellant and irresistable at the same time. You might have noticed I haven't mentioned the plot. Don't worry about it. The plot isn't the thing. Just immerse yourself in Bakshi's mise-en-scene; the characterisations, the dialogue, the backgrounds, the music, the underlying dirtiness and violence - you've got to just absorp the thing as a whole. BTW this film has, in my opinion, the most terrifying moment-of-death scene of any movie I've ever seen (also one of the longest, unless you count 'Jacob's Ladder', which is nothing _but_ a moment of death scene.) Well anyway, I think it's a great adult animated movie. Ugly, dirty, with little socially redeeming value, but if Bakshi's version of Lord of the Rings, or 'Fire and Ice' make you cringe, you might just like this one (alternatively, if for some unfathomable reason you thought his Lord of the Rings was a classic, don't bother with Heavy Traffic. You'll probably hate it.)
Rating:
Summary: Heavy Traffic
Review: Ralph Bakshi is part of a sacred cult of filmmakers who are driven by their passion for their art. His films are aggressive, non-passive in every sense of the term and determined to inspire thought and reaction. To see his films is to witness images so powerful that they seem to break through the screen and enter you. Bakshi, the working-class hero, was always determined to let it be known that he made films for that very audience. A two-fisted filmmaker whose films are full of a kind of grunge-poetry, 'graffiti animation', as Bakshi called it. 'Heavy Traffic', his raw-edged, moving, autobiographical film, goes beyond the limits of art, the limits of cinema, to become a part of you, the reaction the audience gives to this kind of film is a basic part of the film itself. Bakshi's film flies like a Bukowski poem, some sequences so powerfully unsettling that one forgets about everything else. His sad, stark images of a city destroyed by something or another, recalls Marco Ferreri's haunting images of the dead ape on the beach in his masterpiece 'Bye Bye Monkey'. In 'Heavy Traffic', Bakshi tests the limits of art to make something emotionally chaotic. Many will be moved by how natural the dialogue sounds (he recorded most of it on the streets), a lot of it obviously inspired by his own life. Certain scenes, such as the one where the autobiographical protagonist walks with the only person who understands him and mutters 'we're getting nowhere fast' while a symphony strikes chaotically, echoing something we might have heard at one time or another, captures the whole apocalyptic sadness that is so difficult to obtain: melancholy and yet dreadful. Bakshi's cinema is so contradictory and yet so fairly composed in all its ambuguity, that (much like the films of Bernardo Bertolucci) that one can barely have a coherent response to his films: since most of the power comes from the raw force of his images, it is impossible to summarize his films with words, one must use images to describe images. So the chaos remains, and yet we feel we understand, it is the power of art.
Rating:
Summary: Heavy Traffic
Review: The film that was originally X rated then re-rated to an R. Heavy Traffic is about Michael a man in his 20s who draws cartoons. He has an adulterous father who's Italian and a worrying Jewish mother. He leaves home and joins up with a black girl who quits her job at a bar. The film uses great animation and live-action. The film has been called "Powerful, raw and valid". I recommend this film if you love adult animation.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Bakshi film!
Review: This is one of Ralph Bakshi's best films. It is filled with his signature use of pop songs, off-beat/adult subject matter and his specific brand of animation. I find it to be better than FRITZ THE CAT and AMERICAN POP(and STREETFIGHT for that matter). The combination of live-action and animation here is captivating. The dvd makes the film look as good as it can and it includes and entertaining if short theatrical trailer. Well worth owning.
Rating:
Summary: Not your average cartoon!
Review: This movie is strange. I love the animation especially from the 1970s ERA. This movie is hillarious. Don't expect to know what's going on. This isnt about the life of some celebrity. The Writer had just drew something up off his mind and posted on the big screen. And Yes, it's funny.
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