Trivia for
Heavy Metal (1981) More at IMDbPro »

• The home video was removed from circulation for several years because of problems with music licensing.
  
  
• The film was inspired by a long-running science fiction magazine of the same name, which began in Europe as Metal Hurlant. Most of the story segments are based on stories or characters featured in the magazine.
  
  
• When the robot and the girl are walking through the spaceship arguing about their relationship, a ramp automatically lowers and they walk down it. This is a parody of the lowered ramp sequence in Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), when the alien emerges from the spaceship.
  
  
• The storyline that connected the various tales was dubbed the "Grimaldi Segment". Austin Grimaldi and Joe Grimaldi were part of the sound crew on the film.
  
  
• The graffiti on the side of the space-going party palace reads "Martians are people too".
  
  
• When the aliens are stoned and flying through space, one of the damaged starships they pass is the USS Enterprise.
  
  
• The robot that sells Harry Canyon the hot dog is Robby the Robot.
  
  
• Black Sabbath's Mob Rules is not the same version that came out in 1981, on the LP of the same name. The song in the movie has original drummer Bill Ward; the LP has his replacement Vinny Appice.
  
  
• In the Taarna sequence, as the Barbarian hordes overrun Kraan, a bunny pops out of a barbarian's bedroll for one or two frames.
  
  
• In the original Den storyline, Catherine is an 80-year-old woman on Earth.
  
  
• As in the magazine, the evil emanation Den battles is called Ulultc. That is Cthulu spelled backwards, a reference to the God of Chaos in the mythology of H.P. Lovecraft.
  
  
• Elmer Bernstein's theme for Taarna was actually written for the character of Alex in Saturn 3 (1980). The theme was never heard in the film, so Bernstein used it for this film.
  
  
• In the "So Beautiful, So Dangerous" segment, the two Plutonian Nyborg snorting aliens are named Zeke and Edsel.
  
  
• According to his creator, Richard Corben, Den's name is an acronym for David Ellis Norman.
  
  
• This Canadian film has no Canadian artists on it's soundtrack
  
  

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