Flashback: Pink Floyd the Wall blends animation, rock musical and art-house movie
Bandleader Roger Waters, animator Gerald Scarfe and director Alan Parker fought relentlessly during production but their film has aged remarkably well
This film version of the 1979 Pink Floyd album of the same name is more of a curiosity than a classic. Part animation, part rock musical and part art-house movie, it’s a head-on clash of artistic styles that pleased none of its makers yet still succeeds as a belligerent social treatise.
Although it was derided on its release in 1982 in Britain, a time when the rock cognoscenti had abandoned the intellectual pleasures of progressive music for the down-to-earth rebellion of punk and new wave, The Wall has weathered well. It’s also a testament to a time when rock bands felt they should make meaningful and controversial art, rather than just knuckle down and accept their place in the corporate moneymaking machine.
Like the album, the film was the idea of Pink Floyd bassist and de facto leader Roger Waters. It was also, like the album, a creative process riven with violent arguments, internecine battles and underhand dealings. Waters had always intended the album to become a film that starred him in the lead role and featured the animation of satirist Gerald Scarfe.
