Amazon.com: Animator-director-screenwriter Ralph Bakshi audaciously tries to chronicle the history of 20th-century American popular music, while also placing each period into historical and social context--all in 97 minutes! Its animated, episodic narrative follows four generations of Jewish-American musicians as each painfully seeks fame through changing musical eras. Starting at the turn of the century with a piano-playing immigrant in New York, the film moves swiftly, following his offspring through such movements as Gershwin-era pop, jazz, folk music, '60s psychedelia, and punk--and only pauses for elaborate, energized musical numbers designed to showcase the work of Benny Goodman, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Lou Reed, the Jefferson Airplane, and numerous others. However, these electric set pieces provide brief dynamism in a relatively bleak film filled with hard-luck protagonists suffering through clichéd drug addiction, death, and alienation. While the film's scope is admirably ambitious, and Bakshi's stylized use of rotoscoping (tracing animation from live action) makes for fluid and often eye-popping visuals, his treatment also feels heavy handed and cuts numerous corners. And, when Baskshi ends his epic by mocking punk, and celebrating the future of rock & roll through the music of Bob Seger, one wonders whether or not he a knowledgeable grasp of his topic at all. The DVD version presents the film in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1. --Dave McCoy
Impressive Pop This is a classic. Visually stunning and engaging, it follows a family through several generations trying to make it in the entertainment industry.
In my opinion, Bakshi outdid himself with this one.
My only problem is that the final episode was too easy. It lacked the pathos of the rest of the movie. It seemed like an anticlimax.
But the music was great!
An incredible dedication to American Pop music and culture Probably the most outrageous animated film I've seen. You are never left doubting the creative vision of the filmmakers. Some of the music seems a bit out of left field, but generally well picked. Enjoy.
An American classic by an American master... An honest look at American pop music and the roots of it's pain and suffering buried beneath the commercial glitz of mass-media marketing. I've seen the film mistakenly reviewed as a condemnation of punk music and a glorification of top forty hit makers and nothing is further from the truth. Bakshi takes us through the roots of American music and the suffering of the people it has always masked. We sing because we seek relief from our daily suffering. As the pain gets worse the music gets angrier and angrier until we are screaming though the music of today that enough is enough. We are human beings, not cogs in the great machine of the industrial complex. As we get buried deeper and deeper beneath the insensitive, uncaring excrement of the corporate entity our need for rebellion gets harder and harder to suppress. Music is humanities cry for recognition of our souls. It is our rebellion against the corporate entity that sees us only as machine parts to be used as nothing more than production tools in the manufacture of profit for the corporate [...].
Happy with product American pop came in a timely manner. The item was packed well and the dvd plays wonderful. I'm very happy with my product. Sphinx
A CLASSIC I GREW UP WITH!!! I first saw this movie on cable TV when I was 11 years old in 1982. Having loved music since I could remember, I was immediately drawn to this film. While the premise of the movie seems a little flimsy at times to some people, you have to ask: Has this ever been done before or since? I think if you give this film a chance you won't be dissapointed. 5 stars all around!!!!!
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Tailipoe
Trevor
