Mike Gross: "This story makes up for every frame of the film which might be thought to have a sexist bias against women. Not only does she not have a name or a voice, she's very focused on what she's going to do: she's just going to kill the bad guys." 14 John Bruno: "We did want to have this woman be the ultimate woman warrior. The plans for who Taarna would be were succinctly summed up by those closest to the production:ĭan Goldberg: "We really liked the idea of a woman with a sword who could use it. 11 In its final form, "Taarna" had a mind-boggling 330 scenes, composed of 130,000 drawings-all hand-painted. In February 1981, a stronger ending to the sequence was added in accordance with Reitman's direction. In December, Bruno's suggestions were adopted when progress on the sequence indicated that it would probably be the "most dramatic story," 10 and thus, the Loc-Nar in "Grimaldi," rather than "Taarna," became the linking story. 8 Bruno saw Taarna as a female substitution for the Arzak story, and transferred this concept to her. The only difference was that Arzak rode a 'bird' instead of a horse. It was an abstract Western relocated into a fantastic setting. The mysterious man who never talked, who knew exactly who he was and what he had to do. To me, he was a loner, a character out of a Sergio Leone western. 7 According to Bruno, I had my own ideas of what Arzak was all about. Different little vignettes of Taarna: 30-seconds, 1-minute, 2-minutes as linking devises." 6Īfter John Bruno agreed to work as the sequence director for the Taarna segment in August, 1980, he urged that the script be improved by pulling it together into a cohesive sequence, and adding elements suggestive of a Clint Eastwood/ Sergio Leone western. Originally Taarna was the linking device. 5 As Carl Macek explained, "Taarna was actually even a longer sequence. In the beginning, the writers planned to use the Taarna sequence as the linking device for the other stories. 3 At a meeting with Reitman, a female animator voiced the idea that a heroine should be the central figure in one of the sequences, and her suggestion was eventually adopted. The Taarna story evolved out of conferences among Reitman, Blum and Goldberg in early 1980. Due to legal and financial complications in Europe, however, negotiations to the rights to Arzak fell through. Originally there were 12 short stories in the Heavy Metal screenplay, and Arzak was to be the narrative linkup between the segments. "The Legend of Taarna" began as a story drafted by Leonard Blum and Daniel Goldberg, writers retained by Ivan Reitman to develop a strong, conceptual screenplay for the movie.
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