Heavy Traffic (1973)

88% of critics liked it
(16 reviews)
74% of users liked it
(1,757 ratings)

Heavy Traffic represents a follow-up to animator Ralph Bakshi's first feature film, Fritz the Cat (1972). The central character is Michael, the ingenuous son of an Italian father and Jewish mother. An aspiring cartoonist, Michael leaves home in a huff and outrages his family by conducting an affair… More Heavy Traffic represents a follow-up to animator Ralph Bakshi's first feature film, Fritz the Cat (1972). The central character is Michael, the ingenuous son of an Italian father and Jewish mother. An aspiring cartoonist, Michael leaves home in a huff and outrages his family by conducting an affair with an African-American woman. Heavy Traffic was originally intended to be a cartoon adaptation of Hubert Selby's notorious novel Last Exit to Brooklyn, but negotiations fell through, and Bakshi was obliged to cook up a similar but not identical "mean streets" plotline. (Last Exit to Brooklyn was made as a live-action film in 1989.) ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Rating, Runtime: R, 1 hr. 16 min.
Directed By: Ralph Bakshi
Written By: Ralph Bakshi
Genres: Drama, Action & Adventure, Animation, Comedy

In Theaters: Jan 1, 1973 Wide
On DVD: Sep 5, 2000

Critic Reviews

Jay Cocks, TIME Magazine
Heavy Traffic not only has an authentic tenement toughness but the rough feeling of unassimilated autobiography, of experiences and fantasies still keenly felt.
Variety Staff, Variety
There's something to offend everyone in this melange of crudely conceived, amateurishly animated stuff.
Roger Greenspun, New York Times
A cruel, funny, heartbreaking love note to a city kept alive by its freaks, and always, always dying.
Don Druker, Chicago Reader
Bakshi manages to offend nearly everyone from transvestites to mafiosi; but the comic distancing achieved by his army of animators manages to bring off a most difficult kind of humor: the humor of pain and despair.
, TV Guide's Movie Guide
Filled with autobiographical resonance and razor-edged humor, this is a cynical portrait of one young man's coming of age.
Rob Gonsalves, eFilmCritic.com
A zesty abstract-jazz riff of a film.
, Time Out
The quality of the animation is cornflake packet standard, the script -- one or two minor moments excepted -- a disaster.
Ed Gonzalez, Slant Magazine
...deliriously perverted...
Scott Weinberg, eFilmCritic.com
One of Bakshi's most brazen and bizarrely entertaining.
Ed Gonzalez, Apollo Guide
Ralph Bakshi's cartoon Heavy Traffic ferociously mixes in live-action elements, tracing the schizophrenic journey of a struggling cartoonist through a crippling 70s New York City.
James Kendrick, Q Network Film Desk
A frenetic, over-the-top combination of live action and crude animation that explores the seedy world of New York's Lower East Side in the early 1970s.

Read all 11 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

Tim S

To me, there's always been the Ralph Bakshi movie that everybody has seen (The Lord of the Rings) and then there are the rest that nobody has seen. Heavy Traffic is one of them, along with Coonskin and Fritz the Cat. These films are definitely not for everybody, but if you have a… More
To me, there's always been the Ralph Bakshi movie that everybody has seen (The Lord of the Rings) and then there are the rest that nobody has seen. Heavy Traffic is one of them, along with Coonskin and Fritz the Cat. These films are definitely not for everybody, but if you have a little bit of taste and perhaps an open mind, then you may just enjoy this trip. It's a very cerebral kind of movie, with a lot of visuals that you either get or don't get. The film also has a nice story to it: two people stuck in a ghetto looking for a way out. Along the way, they run into every kind of obstacle while we see it as nothing more than a game on a pinball machine. I know that's not a great description, but trying to describe this film is like trying to describe the color red. It has racism, sexuality and just true-to-life things going on in it. This definitely isn't a kids film, and Bakshi never intended it to be. It shocks me that these films ever got made in the first place, but I'm thrilled that they did. Oh, I'm still very curious about what was taken out of the X rated version of it.
AJ V

A great animated film from Bakshi. It combines cartoon and live action actually. Plus, the story is really good, in that 70s realistic gritty style. I really liked it.
Mike T

This film doesn't have the same cohesiveness or power as Bakshi's later work, Coonskin, but it's still an impressive vision. The influence of Selby Jr. is really visible here, in the style of language and the environment. Horrifying, surreal, surprising, and wholly… More
This film doesn't have the same cohesiveness or power as Bakshi's later work, Coonskin, but it's still an impressive vision. The influence of Selby Jr. is really visible here, in the style of language and the environment. Horrifying, surreal, surprising, and wholly entertaining. I'll take Ralph Bakshi's challenging, adult animated movies over fluff like Pixar's Up any day.