Everything about Human Highway totally explained
Human Highway is a
1982 comedy film starring and co-directed by
Neil Young under his
pseudonym Bernard Shakey.
Dean Stockwell co-directed the film and acted along with
Russ Tamblyn,
Dennis Hopper, and the
post-punk and
new wave band
Devo. Included is an unusual collaborative performance of "
Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" by Devo and Neil Young with
Booji Boy singing lead vocals and Young playing lead guitar.
The film was shown in only select theaters and wasn't released on VHS until 1995. It received mixed reviews and with the benefit of hindsight has received favorable reviews more recently.
Plot
The movie's primary setting is the last day on Earth at a small gas station-diner in a fictional town located next to a nuclear power plant. The characters are diner employees and customers including Young Otto (
Dean Stockwell) who has received ownership of the failing business by the Will of his recently deceased father. One employee, Lionel Switch (
Neil Young) is the garage's goofy and bumbling auto mechanic who dreams of being a rock star. "I can do it!" he often exclaims. After some modest character development and a collage-like dream sequence the story ends with a tongue-in-cheek choreographed musical finale while nuclear war begins.
The opening scene is a foreshadowing on the same set as most of the movie's other scenes with an important difference. It is the gas station-diner, only destroyed post nuclear holocaust. Devo's character "Booji Boy" (
Mark Mothersbaugh) is a lone survivor, but after his cynical prose (excerpted from "My Struggle", by Booji Boys, 1978) the opening credits are a return to present time prior to apocalypse.
"What a day!" the story begins, a nice day like any other it's suggested. Starting at the local nuclear power plant with an ominous soundtrack members of Devo are then introduced characterized as crass nuclear garbagepersons with a superimposed red glow. Apparently, nuclear waste is routinely mishandled and dumped at the nearby town, "Linear Valley". In contrast, the scene is followed by the first appearance of Lionel with his buddy Fred Kelly (
Russ Tamblyn) riding bicycles to work on a cheery sunny day. It is revealed that Old Otto (also Stockwell), Lionel's former boss and owner of the gas station-diner has died of radiation poisoning. The characters remain unaware of these implications as Lionel laments that he himself should have died because he's worked on "almost every radiator in every car in town." The bicycles are stationary with a filmed country scene backdrop. Much of the film's sets are surreal, or animated and likened to The Wizard of Oz in reviews.
Characterization occurs partly through the sharing of oft ill-conceived plans and dreams. All the characters with the exception of the mysterious masked Booji Boy are clueless to the greater context of the plot and in varying degrees to their own life situations.
One example of this is when Charlotte (
Charlotte Stewart) and Lionel are happily sharing their dreams of the future which involves images of a house on the hill and for lack of specific terms are sadly talking about entirely different things.
A particularly clever scene is when Katherine (played by a young
Sally Kirkland) loses her job; rather than leave she sits down at the booth that has a picture on the wall of Old Otto, her prior boss who hired her and "would never" fire her. He has a Heavenly role of watching over the cast. Weeping, she chooses on the juke box the Skeeter Davis hit "End of the World," a song about lost love. This is a four fold poignant moment which includes loss of job, loss of Otto (through death, rather than the lyrical loss of love) and lastly... "Don't they know it's the end of the world?" can be taken quite literally. It is the companion lyric to others in the sound track: "I won't be worried long!" of "It Takes a Worried Man" and "We're still a-livin'.. so everything's okay," by Hank Williams. This is an example of the film's dry wit.
This also is one of the few films that gives Geraldine Baron a dynamic and prominent role. As head waitress "Irene" she's the smart comedic lines. She is charming as she includes herself into Young Otto's private scheme. She is in Lionel's erotic dream. As much of the main cast, she also is fairly prominent in the dance finale. Baron did teaching at the
New York Actor's Studio and cast-directing in following years.
The last quarter of the movie is the extended dream sequence caused by Lionel's bump on the head. In the last portion of the dream is a ten minute jam of Devo and Neil Young performing "Hey, Hey, My, My". Shortly after Lionel's waking there's the start of global nuclear war. Upon its arrival the characters are not sure what is happening until it's disturbingly announced by Booji Boy as "the hour of sleep" who then provides shovels, suggests metaphorical "last minute shopping" and commands everyone to "dig that hole and dance like a mole!" The entire diner cast then breaks into a fun-spirited song and dance adaptation of "It Takes a Worried Man" choreographed by Tamblyn. After the planet is engulfed in radioactive glow then the cast, still festive, is seen climbing a stairway to heaven accompanied by both harp music and the credits.
Symbolism and Lionel's Dream
There is use of symbolism. Milk is "Whiteness" and the accompanying illusions of success and potency of a dominant culture. This is most exhibited by the role of the handsome milkman, Earl Duke (
David Blue), dressed in white and later by the first portion of Lionel's dream involving a milk bath. The raven (which is black) is a voice of Nature and warns of pending failures.
"Goin' Back" is the one song by Neil Young in the movie played in its entirety which has also been released as an album track. It is in the middle portion of Lionel's dream sequence and the images help to explain lyrics of the song as well as underlying symbolism in the movie. The lyrics are partly about dreaming of past Native Americans as well as living assimilated into a dominant culture.
Images include a
Pow Wow where Lionel (while also dreaming of being a rock star) is playing his music while Native Americans are dancing and burning
wooden Indians in a bon fire. This is multi-layered in meaning as of course Neil Young actually is a rock star and the wooden Indians have roles throughout the film as elements of false support. For example, appreciating music while waking and imagining he's a star, Lionel plays percussion on his mechanic's wrenches to a wooden Indian as his audience. After a chance meeting with his rock-star idol, Frankie Fontaine (also Young) who appears to lead an opulent, sequestered and drug influenced life-style, Lionel says to the same wooden-Indian, "Now there's a real human being!" The wooden Indians are also presented in Lionel's first dream-time stage performance as his back up band. Note that Young's long-time band is named
Crazy Horse. Wooden Indians have also often been viewed as an indignity to Native American culture. Burning illusion, returning to roots and healing the past, the Pow Wow bon fire is a liberating moment. A wooden Indian burning in the Pow Wow bon fire is the final image at the close of "Goin' Back."
Credits
Cast (in credit order)
Video release
The movie was only released in a VHS fullscreen edition (as well as LaserDisc) by
WEA in 1995, twelve years after its initial screening. It hasn't been re-released, or transferred to
DVD as of September 2007. Several scenes from the movie appeared on the Devo music video collections
We're All Devo and
The Complete Truth About Devolution, and were edited to appear as one continuous video for the song "Worried Man".
Film quotes
"Time to fortify the ol' water supply." - nuclear garbageperson
"That's good gas!" - Booji Boy
"It's Byrd gas!" - FredFurther Information
Get more info on 'Human Highway'.
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