Unfiltered: The Complete Ralph Bakshi
I think my favorite Bakshi story is from Howard Beckerman: According to Howard (and it’s hard for me to tell if this is just a legend or not) it seems that Ralph was borrowing mob money to finish an animated film which was way behind schedule. He would keep begging his animators to please finish the scene so he pay off his backers. But sadly the poor animators couldn’t pull of the deadline and the next day Ralph Bakshi showed up in the studio with a broken arm.
This story may not be true, although it’s a good reflection on just how hard it is to make an animated film — and Ralph was doing that in the late 70s and early 80s when it was very out of style and Disney was on the rocks. So it’s nice to see that Ralph’s work is being celebrated these days and there is a great book that’s out on him:
On a related note I discovered this great interview with Bakshi from 1982 when he had just finished the film Hey Good Lookin’ which was shot by Ira Gallen:
And here’s a scene from the film: