Time Masters (1982)

imdb

Seven-year-old Piel follows his adventurer dad while they're scouting out this weird-as-hell planet called Lost. Things go south fast, and the dad ends up dumping him in some dreamlike forest—leaving him with this egg that lets him talk to the environment, provided there’s another matching egg nearby. The catch? Piel is way too young to wrap his head around the abstract nonsense this whole situation requires.



René Laloux was born in Paris back in 1929. After art school, he was such a standout talent he snagged a scholarship for painting. Once he finished, he got stuck grinding in the commercial sector—which he didn't give a damn about—but he survived by cranking out quick graphic designs for ads. He became kind of obsessed with how basic consumer impulses worked through his posters, which led him to study psychology. Eventually, he landed a gig at a psych ward as an art therapist. He noticed most patients experienced art way beyond the frame—they’d scribble all over it and project their own stuff onto it—and that gave him the idea to practice animation techniques using these mentally fractured clients. He eventually linked up with Paul Grimault’s animation studio and, while working at the asylum, produced the animated film The Teeth of the Monkey (1960)—with a script actually written by the most extreme cases from the very institution that was paying his bills to let him pursue this hobby. After Roland Topor saw the film—one of the guys behind the Panic movement, a close buddy of Alejandro Jodorowsky, and a total fanatic for tapping into the minds of the mentally ill—Laloux was hooked for life on animating the raw, unhinged side of the human psyche. He teamed up with Topor for the hit The Savage Planet (1973) and a few shorts before basically disappearing by the late '70s, totally burnt out from spending so much time in mental hospitals. His final projects were done with Jean Giraud, the legendary American comic artist known as Moebius, focusing on wild interpretations of alternate origins and parallel worlds—mostly pulled from the more radical works of Isaac Asimov. Laloux passed away from a heart attack in 2004 in some isolated village, totally alone, forgotten, and detached from reality after years of being out of the game. (Source: KKS)

You can find a version with English dubbing on YouTube here:

Wow... pure torture.

I'll check it out once I'm back. (If I don't make it by then, it'll have to wait until after the Christmas holidays—who knows when I'll finally be free?).

The French really are too good.
I actually just watched
JUST A GIGOLO
today (it’s a different genre, but it captures that signature French simplicity and genius);https://www.youtube.com/watch=IkPH0-DF8ik

🍿🍿

There’s just something about those sci-fi animated flicks from the 80s... they have this magic, you know? Between the settings, the vibes, the soundtracks, and that stunning, almost hypnotic animation style, it turns into this total psychedelic trip.

It kind of reminds me of other movies from that era I saw when I was way younger. Back then, the stories didn't really grab me—not because anything was actually wrong with them! They work perfectly fine exactly as they are, I just think I would've been much more sucked into the experience if I'd seen them back when I was first discovering stuff like this and could actually appreciate it properly (felt the same way about Laloux's Fantastic Planet when I watched it recently, too).

For me, the draw here is purely the design and how everything looks visually... and honestly, if that alone makes it worth a watch, then it's worth it. I mean, it's Moebius, after all!

Fantastic Planet and Time Masters were both top-tier for me; Gandahar was a bit of a letdown by comparison, though still quite solid.

On another note, Hangar7 released the Wulov novel that inspired Fantastic Planet last year. To be honest, I’ve heard mixed reviews about the quality, but I'll probably give it a read whenever I happen to run into it.

The design is killer, obviously—classic vibes with those static characters you see in old-school French comics. 😁That little time-travel twist near the end adds some layers to the plot, making things a bit more complex, but even without it, the whole thing is charming and a blast. It’s not quite hitting that *Star Wars* level of epicness though—it feels more geared toward kids and teens.

I found the execution pretty interesting. I’m honestly not sure if this is meant for kids, though, because you have certain scenes that feel totally juvenile while others are just downright grotesque... it gives off more of an adult animation vibe. The whole atmosphere reminds me of those classic sci-fi epics from the late '70s and '80s, something along the lines of Silent Running.