Gandahar (1988) Online

'Light Years' is a work of sci-fi animation that really stands apart from the pack. In order to enjoy this film, one must have an appreciation of science fiction altogether. For those individuals such as Leonard Maltin, whom dismissed this movie as a pretentious 'talky' cartoon, you must understand that 'Light Years' tells a very human story about irresponsible inventions and ignorance in a completely ALIEN setting; this is the true magic of the film! I thought the dialogue was creative and the story was fascinating. The creatures and characters are beyond description, and the ending will blow you away. True sci-fi fans I think should dismiss Leonard Maltin's review and rent this one!

French animator Rene Laloux of "Fantastic Planet" renown, attempted to make another surreal sci-fi adventure with the 80's "Ghandar" or as Isac Asimov and Harvey Wienstien decided to call it for those of us in the states "Light Years", which since no... space travel takes place, and since the movie is about a fictional country called "Gandahar" is probably a bad title. "Light Years" I guess sounds more sci-fi-ish, and if this film was to succeed in the states(it didn't) it was gonna need every bit of conventionality it could muster.

The story is a complex one involving the standard sci-fi tropes of eugenics, time travel, death, and utopia, and though it's certainly more involved than most animated sci-fi (a good deal of the time were watching the characters talk), it's really the visualization of the world and it's inhabitants which makes this movie worth seeing.

Like "Fantastic Planet" before it, Laloux's environments are some of the most alien that have ever been imagined. The landscape is often undulating Daliesuqe deserts, which strange trees which resemble simultaneously bodily organs and geysers, a young girl offering her breast to a new born who looks like a tapir, born out of a grown embryonic plant, a city of underground mutants who resemble Blemmyes, ancient African monsters with heads beneath their shoulders, an army hollow soldiers who turn people into statues, video camera like birds who can lift entire buildings in swarms, and of course a colossal mile wide sentient brain in the middle of the ocean.

Laloux uses sci-fi story structures to create, very evocative images that do not look like anyone else's, ever, something few filmmakers in any medium or genre, can claim with straight face.

That being said the English voice acting is just decent, not great but decent, it keeps the story moving, but doesn't draw you into any of the characters. "Light Years" like "Fantastic Planet" or the animated films of Svankmajer are more concerned with form than content, but not oblivious of the latter.

So if you like heady sci-fi, visually stunning design, and unique animation, this is not to be passed up. If not it's probably not bad to see once anyway, just for the visual treat of it all, and the more I mull over the story, not the plot, I'm more impressed with how well and vividly it told me a story I've heard a hundred times before.

It truly is a shame that no one's ever heard of this breathtakingly beautiful piece of animation. It's also a shame that animation is not usually employed in America as an adult art form. Animation shows us lifeforms and landscapes the likes of which cannot be seen on this Earth. Anyway, this is an amazing film that should be checked out by all anime fans as well as fans of films like Heavy Metal, or master animator Ralph Bakshi's works. Light Years is one of the most enlightening animated works on this planet.

about time and utopic realities. The animation is wonderful and detailed. Everything serves perfectly the telling of the story. And the hand of Asimov is not only in the novel, but also in the adaptation to the screen, so that is faithful to his representation of life. Worth watching a few times.

It is a very good anticipation movie. the part describing the lovely and environmental gandahar is wonderful. While renewing a 70's vision of sex, nature and happiness, the colors, sounds and pictures (a young girl offering her breast to a new born invented animal who looks like a tapir, born out of a grown plant). the story: mixing future and past, threatening the present by having itself created in the past, the elements that will be dangerous in the future. It is also a huge criticism of the liability of the human being regarding its evil habit to master the nature, th human body and science. In the end, scientific rubbish save the human beings from a great scientific discovery they made years ago. Happiness is conditioned by assuming one's mistakes. A great philosophical tale. The blue skinned woman with head-wings is very impressive, as well as the very beautiful nude females.

This film was one of the first science fiction cartoons I had seen. Perhaps that is the reason for my high praise of the film. I was engrossed from the very beginning. The dialouge was masterful. What the animation lacked, the combination of the writing and my imagination more than made up for. This film has a PG rating for brief nudity, but I think that children ages 10 on will be very pleased. It treats the audience not as a child or an adult. If you are a fan of hardcore science fiction then this film is for you. If you have never seen a single sci-fi film before, then this is the perfect blend of action and thought provoking images to introduce you to the genre. I will not get into details about the story. You can read the synopsis. In short, I highly recommend this film.

It's not an outstanding movie by any means, but it gets the job done and entertains. One has to remember that when viewing sci-fi often the plot takes precedence over character. Most plot driven films and stories are like that: We're given the bare bones of our protagonist, and watch him or her weave their way through a story.

Such it is with "Light Years." The animation is certainly above the quality of your typical commercial studio, but is not as dazzling as say a Japanese Anime space opera, nor a Disney Production feature; but it does have a certain quality unto itself. Even so the movie could've used more shots (cutaways and general coverage) to help move the story and highlight the characters more. As it stands more the shots are rather static, and the animation in them shifts gears a little too often. In some scene the animation is very smooth, where other times is seems very long and drawn out, or just not well staged.

The film itself has action, but some of the it is stilted and painfully slow, where other times it moves quite well. The dubbing is adequate, though, like all dubbed films, one gets the sense that it doesn't quite catch the tones and inflections of the voices from the original French cast.

Technology and regimented existence are pitted against the organic and under-dogs of Ghandahar in a typical sci-fi theme. The film's worth a night's rental, and if you like collecting rare sci-fi this might be one to add to your collection. Otherwise it may only be worth a single viewing.

*EDIT* French Region 2 DVD review, Jan 3, 2010

Well, I finally saw the original French film in all its entirety. As an American I have to say that I appreciate the additional footage, and can nod at the more subtle pacing, but I do have to say that I think the Americanized version has some pluses going for, namely in the music. The original French score underlines the basic theme of what is being presented. There are no heroics on the battlefield nor purely desperate moments as would be conveyed by the American musical score. The other subtleties are apparent, and I think I better understand why the American producers did what they did by sexing up what they could. The French film is more prosaic and "European" (for lack of a better term) in its presentation of a world in crisis. There's an emotional malaise characteristic of European cinema as a whole that comes across in the original French version. There's a subtle (and not so subtle) nihilistic quality here. Perhaps there's a bit of Nazi occupation still resonating within this film.

All I can really say is that it's a different film from the American version. I'm not sure I prefer one too much over the other. There's a lack of celebration in the French film. There's a kind of fatalistic quality to that is twisted but still present in the American version. Whereas the French version of this film emphasizes weathering the storm and completing the objective, the American version emphasizes confronting the challenge in a way that we Americans have always done. There's a lack of ambient depression that seems to hang and mildly envelope European art, film included. A kind of ethereal drawn out emotionalism that you'd never see in an American film, but is fairly strong in Russian and Swedish cinema, and hits French and Italian films in a less powerful vein.

I would be interested in seeing a DVD of the American version to make a more thought out and proper comparison. But I guess that'll have to wait.

This movie is set on a different planet. It starts with an unknown force destroying the people of a naturalistic utopia civilization. A soldier is set out on a mission to investigate this force. The story is interesting with the force slowly being revealed and then battled. There is also an interesting time travel concept which makes it more mysterious. I thought it got a little too fast-paced near the end though. The best part about this movie is the animation. It's not very refined or high quality but the style and the creativity in the design of this world and it's creatures is amazing. Most of the characters aren't interesting though. At all. The main protagonist has absolutely no personality throughout the movie and his voice acting isn't very good either,and his love interest has a bit more but still is more like a cipher. The only other main character, the villain is much better with his manipulative and all-knowing personality, and creepy voice acting. Despite it's flaws, I think this movie would be great for animation and science fiction fans.

Well, I have to admit that I hunted this particular movie for 10 years. I've seen it for the first time when I was in my early teens (12 or 13, not sure), and I was really impressed by the animation and the plot. Besides, I didn't have a chance to see a lot of sci-fi movies (let alone animated movies) back then.

Now, that I've been able to see it again, I find it really outdated (or "old-skul") - pretty much, it felt like Kubrick's "Space Odissey" animated, only that "Gandahar" came out in late 80es, when "Akira" set a new industry standard. The plot is more or less predictable, the sci-fi backgrounds looked like something from mid-70es, and the battle scenes are even worse than those of cheap Japanimation TV series.

Despite all the bad things above, this movie got a touch of a master. First, I have to admit that movement animation feels highly original (I can't think of anything similar) and is done with a lot of skill. Second, the voices (in French) are much better than anything I've heard. Finally, I find character design very good.

To sum up, I don't think that this is quite the right movie to see "just for fun", but for those who are interested in animation it is definitely a must.

Even though the story was not originally from Asimov, for those who have read most of Asimov's classic science fiction (as a friend says, Asimov's Science fiction written in the 40's will always be science fiction even in 2006), the world 'Gandahar' represents an Asimov' Utopia-not in our galaxy- just like in the books, "The Gods Themselves", and "Foundation's Edge" (Gaia). The movie is very surreal and artistic but compared to other contemporary science fiction animations, it is not that technically sound. Some of the ideas I liked in the movie are: Before the beginning credits, one sees a fisherwoman using music to catch flying fish, the illustration of banished deformed people, and the use of genetically modified creatures in transportation, war and reconnaissance (one- eyed "mirror birds"). I also really liked the idea of a society leaded by a matriarchal system. This movie receives a rating of 8 out of 10 from me.

I haven't seen this film since I was about 11 years old (no rental store has it), however this is an excellent movie, filled with prophecies, rebellion, and good morals.

Gandahar is set during a time when an empire rules the world with a steady fist, and a person is sent to the future to fulfill a prophecy created by the ruler 1000 years before. "Gandahr was will be saved." Gandahar details how a person from the past tries to save the future.

Gandahar reminds me of Frank Herbert's Dune series. If you like Dune, Blade Runner, Star Wars, The Matrix, or any George Lucas film, then this movie is definitely worth a watch.

Seen first when I was about 12 or so, Light Years (as it is known in the US) was a fantastic, dreamlike journey through a surreal Sci-Fi landscape. It's been one of my favorite animated films ever since.

**Spoilers below**

Though it may not be your particular brand of vodka (as the previous mixed comments suggest), it's definitely a well-done effort. The storyline itself is a bit complex, but the basic idea is fascinating. The 'Metal Men' who make up the army of the future, evil brain entity and their cities and surrounding world are appropriately detailed and well drawn. They give you are real feeling of inhumanity and implacable resolve. I particularly enjoyed the mutant race that appears in the future setting. A note to parents though, like an earlier comment mentioned, there is some partial nudity at a few points during the film. It is not sexual in nature and not really very provocative at all, but as a parent you should be aware. (Note, I saw it when I was 12 and wasn't emotionally or psychologically damaged by the animated breasts). If you have the opportunity, see it and decide for yourself.

Version watched: Gandahar - with English subtitles.

I have a suspicion that most of the people who regard this film with such high esteem first saw it when they were kids and watch it now in a glow of happy nostalgia. Coming to it for the first time as a middle-aged man this film is a clumsily animated, ponderously slow, soporific bore; the much lauded 'truly alien' landscapes and animals are disappointingly dull compared with the lurid and fertile illustrations that filled the pages of the SF magazines I grew up reading in the Sixties and Seventies, and the story is very clichéd and thin. Which is a pity, because I came to Gandahar with fond childhood memories of René Laloux's 1967 film La planète sauvage and was hoping for some real screen magic.

I always try to learn something from every film I watch, this time I think I learnt that maybe sometimes the memory of a film is more vital, interesting and real than the film itself. I very much doubt if this is a new idea but I'm not going to put it to the test. I haven't seen La planète sauvage for many many years and having seen this I doubt if I ever will again, just in case I destroy the fond memories I have of it.

I also learnt that if you read really really fast you can watch subtitled films on fast forward and not miss a sodding thing.

It's not as bad as some people want to make you think. "Time Masters" is much better, but if you like "Time Masters" (and like it much more than "The Fantastic Planet") then you'll probably like "Gandahar" (aka "Light Years") too.

It's true, it has a lot of talk, but that's because it HAS a real story instead of other so called adult animation movies. The music wasn't bad (I even find it good), but especially one music was getting on my nerves at the end of the film. The animation isn't a breakthrough either, but with it's light effects and the fantastic backgrounds it was 100 times better than the animation in Fantastic Planet. On the other hand it's falling to dust if compared to the best Japanese animation films at that time like "Akira" for example.

Go and decide for yourself!

I noticed this movie at a local rental place the other week and thought, 'What on Earth is THIS?'

My dad has a book with 17,000 movie reviews--just reviews ranging from a sentence to a couple of paragraphs--and they gave it 2 1/2 stars--3 being good--so it was almost good (to them). They chastised the almost non-existent characterizations, which I agree; we're given a character, we're given about half a minute background on them, and then this is what the character has to do. I was surprised that they didn't mention the almost non-existent voice "acting" (note the quotes), as everyone just pretty much mumbled their lines...even such a big talent as Glenn Close (playing the queen) didn't help.

However, please note these are VERY minor gripes. I would've given the movie three stars myself. It's not the typical sci-fi, with the stupidity of childhood geniuses and robots with feelings abound (and I don't think the stereotypes of "oh no, it's sci-fi AND a cartoon!" help either). It's very imaginative, but pretty dark and apocalyptic; probably not for kids under the age of 6, if not 8.

And on a side note, there was some pretty good music in it, too, and a lot of it.

While Rene Laloux's Fantastic Planet is his most famous film, I consider Light Years his best. Like Fantastic Planet, it is extraordinarily imaginative and visually striking. There are all sorts of odd moments; swirling brain cells forming shapes, a woman suckling a strange creature, a tribe of misshapen people, each one different in equally twisted and disturbed ways.

However, this movie has a much more engrossing story than Fantastic Planet. It is a weird tale of time travel and bizarre experimentation, with a hero who often seems more flukishly lucky than skilled.

I saw the English-dub version, as opposed to the original French version called Gandahar. The voice acting is good, particularly Christopher Plummer. For some reason the American producers threw out the original score for a synth-heavy new score. I found the original on youtube and watched a little, and I would say the original score was better, but not by so much that it really effects the movie. Since the youtube video was in French, I can't tell if the story or dialogue are especially different.

For me, this is easily the best of Laloux's three features (followed by Fantastic Planet).

I was going through what had been labeled "bad", so bad they are funny to watch movies, online when I came across this movie. Like the others I was only watching a minute here or a minute there to see how ridiculous or bad these movies really were, but when I found this movie it was different. When I skipped around I found myself getting pulled in by the movie more and more. What started as a quick moment here or a minute there evolved into me staying over 10 minutes each time I skipped around. I eventually got to the point though where I stopped skipping around at all, I just watched the last half hour of the film in whole. Now that night I had 0 plans of watching a whole movie, just spend maybe an hour jumping around different old animations on a playlist until a certain point that night where I had plans. I was so pulled in by every moment of this movie I canceled my plans that night and started the movie over to watch it fully again start to finish. This out of nowhere movie has cemented itself in my recommended list from this point forward.

It feels too easy to call Rene Laloux's animated movies "trippy", as if one can only appreciate them while on drugs. But there's a kind of weird dream logic mixed with hallucinogenic science fiction that Laloux, along with his collaborator Moebius and Alejandro Jodorowsky, seems to have mastered. Unfortunately, Gandahar was his last feature film, and not his best. But for animation buffs or fans of weird sci-fi, it's well worth a look.

Gandahar uses a fairly straightforward, action-driven space opera plot line. It dramatizes the clash between nature and technology, perhaps in an over-literal way. Most of the above-mentioned weirdness comes from a race of misshapen seers that speak in impossible tenses, and a plot that requires time travel to a point which is simultaneously past and future. It's not convoluted, but it's impossible to understand just as actual time travel would be to our chronologically-limited minds. Oh, and there are lots of breasts, most of them belonging to blue people. Between that and the violence, Gandahar is certainly much less child-friendly than Laloux's other films.

Gandahar isn't really original as a whole, although there's a lot of fun absurdities like giant crabs throwing rocks at armies of metal men. But it's a fun watch, with just enough weirdness to put it above the familiar repertoire of 1980s science fiction. If you're a fan of any of the artists mentioned above, this is a must-see. If you're not, maybe give Gandahar a chance anyway. Who knows, you might like it.

I rented this film because I am a fan of 'adult' animation, and because it was directed by Rene Laloux, who also did 'Fantastic Planet'. And tho' there are a few impressive scenes, for the most part this is a very talky, very plodding movie. The animation is not that good, and the music is very cheesy. Skip this movie, and rent 'Fantastic Planet' instead.

Some interesting ideas but best left in a book or at least a better adaptation, please. This is the sort of thing that gives non-children's animation a bad name, and SCI-FI for that matter. A meandering plot, no engaging characters to care about, no emotional engagement what so ever. It feels like the whole thing has been turned to stone. Oh and the animation is terrible. US and Japanese techniques at this time were years ahead. It is so crude and dull it makes mid-80's Scooby Doo look like Toy Story! But more important and unforgivable is the story and characters. And it takes itself so seriously. Interestingly it shows a race that creates without any regard for what will happen in the future and those things come back to destroy them. e.g. Osama, Saddam... But there was no punishment for those who created the monsters, just a nasty demise for the monsters for being evil. What is this trying to teach?

Imagine the barbaric Fire and Ice! The epicness of Heavy Metal! The acid-laced mystique of Fantastic Planet! All of these wrapped into one powerhouse of an animated classic! You'll watch this movie, and wonder if you're watching the prequel to the story of Rush's 2112. It has an undertone of a monolithic society, but with sentinel invaders from the future trying to kill them off like thousands of Sara Connors. Although I've only seen versions of this with English subtitles, the masterpiece that it is kept me drawn in with interesting characters and awesome action sequences. I showed this movie to many of my friends and some people that love '80s animation, and they added this to their Top 10 animated list. As a kid, this is one of the styles that made me want to be an artist and animator. One of my favorite animated movies of all time!

I have started watching all of the Rene Laloux animation films. They are imaginative, intriguing, original. For me, Fantastic Planet was a perfect film, for example. Gandahar starts with a similar story: sometime in the future, a colony of Earth where people have achieved nirvana by using biotechnology is attacked by metal men. They are in essence the Cybermen of Doctor Who. Spoiled by their perfect world, Gandaharians don't know how to defend themselves anymore. They send "their best, but inexperienced, agent", whatever that means, to investigate. Thus we get to see the strange alien planet, meet their nemesis and understand the story.

So strange alien planet it is. Nice absurd ecosystem: check. Unabashedly naked women, European style? Galore. Weird and spooky soundtrack, too. But the story was weak, the cautionary moral not really well detailed and, worst of all, the arrogant cerebral intonation of all dialogue did not work in this film. While in Fantastic Planet it lent authority to the race of Traggs, here it just sounds like lazy voice acting. Perhaps the American voice-over, with huge stars like Glenn Close and Christopher Plummer would have been better, but I make a point of sampling the original version of a movie.

My conclusion: after 15 years since La Planete Sauvage (Fantastic Planet) a movie with a similar alien theme, but a much weaker story and no real increase in animation quality, cannot impress me. It is still a nice film to watch, but my expectations were very high to begin with. Also, for 1988, the year of Grave of the Fireflies and even Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the animation feels really outdated.

One of my all time favorite movies from my childhood. Up there with Fantastic Planet, Hey Good Looking, and many other of similar nature. Spent some time searching for those movie on disc.. Turns out they did do many dvd and even bluray copies for country of origin (france) along with all the Euro nations. As many if not all have the same video codec. I ordered that, even though I knew it wouldn't work on the typical dvd or bluray player. Will work on your PC.. But to find the American copy. You can check out a hidden gem of a website called "Times Forgotten". Where I was able to purchase a copy of the American version..

This appears to be an animated version of some semi-erotic European SF comic. While arguably some of the animation is undetailed and stingy with motion, creative art direction offsets this to a large degree. In fact, a good deal of this movie is jaw dropping, sweeping vistas of Flash-Gordon-meets-Hieronymous-Bosch. If only it was as well animated as, say, He-man, well, then you'd really have something. The plot doesn't make a whole lot of sense, it's something at once simplistic about killer robots at the beck and call of this giant glans-brain-anus beaked floating squid thing, and something overly convoluted about potato faced mutants and time travel. The later have a speaking device which will not add to your comprehension of the ending of the movie about talking in then-now-later, "I will did are going gone went over under behind then now later." May well be as enjoyable with your favorite psychedelic music as soundtrack instead of that business, fun to watch high. If you like Barbarella or Heavy Metal, you'll dig this.

René Laloux never did make another movie as intriguingly bizarre as "Fantastic Planet". But Gandahar comes close. It provides not only a sci-fi world, but one with no relation to our planet Earth. Its culture, environments, and fauna are quite foreign.

Sadly, Gandahar doesn't have the artistic tone to make it truly stand out. Fantastic Planet's use of color, stop motion, and music emphasized the alien feeling. Gandahar doesn't particularly amaze in any of these areas. It has more focus on plot, but it isn't very strong. The protagonist has little character to him, and some elements were cheesy. The robots look like they came from the 50s, and the "rebellion" at the end has been seen dozens of times after Star Wars.

Still, there are some cool, weird scenes and concepts in the movie. If you don't expect something as great as Fantastic Planet, its a fun distraction. Make sure NOT to watch the "Light Years" English dub cut! D: