Heavy Traffic - Response

Response

Although Heavy Traffic received an X rating from the Motion Picture Association of America, more theaters were willing to screen adult-oriented animated features because of the success of Fritz the Cat, and Heavy Traffic was a box office success. Ralph Bakshi was the first person in the animation industry since Walt Disney to have two financially successful films back-to-back. The film is considered to be Bakshi's biggest critical success. Newsweek wrote that the film contained "black humor, powerful grotesquerie and peculiar raw beauty. Episodes of violence and sexuality are both explicit and parodies of flesh-and-blood porn a celebration of urban decay." Charles Champlin wrote in The New York Times that the film was "furious energy, uncomfortable to watch as often as it is hilarious." The Hollywood Reporter called it "shocking, outrageous, offensive, sometimes incoherent, occasionally unintelligent. However, it is also an authentic work of movie art and Bakshi is certainly the most creative American animator since Disney." Film website Rotten Tomatoes, which compiles reviews from a wide range of critics, gives the film a score of 88%. Vincent Canby ranked it among his "Ten Best Films of 1973". The film was banned by the film censorship board in the province of Alberta, Canada when it was originally released.

Michael Barrier, an animation historian, described Heavy Traffic and Fritz the Cat as "not merely provocative, but highly ambitious." Barrier described the films as an effort "to push beyond what was done in the old cartoons, even while building on their strengths."