"Human Highway" is a 1982 slapstick buddy comedy set in a surreal post-apocalypse, directed by, and starring Neil Young and Dean Stockwell, with additional music and acting by Devo. Even this basic description is a lot to unpack.
Neil Young is obviously most famous for his music (and by some people, for his work with model railroads). Neil Young is also usually known for being a rather serious singer, with songs dealing with topics such as drug addiction, civil rights and mortality. Which makes the idea of him writing and starring in a comedy, even a bizarre and surreal one, unusual. I have to admit that when I first saw Neil Young, as mechanic Lionel Hitch, riding his bicycle to work with co-worker Fred Kelly (Russ Tambyln), it took me a while to realize it was him. The trademark gravelly voice is gone, replaced with a squeaky, dorky voice, and with his face screwed up in a comedic grimace. His posture, voice and manners are all so different from my image of Neil Young. He resembles Rick Moranis, although since Strange Brew came out the year after this movie, maybe it is vice-versa. Which I guess is the definition of acting. The other actors, including Dennis Hopper, Charlotte Stewart and Sally Kirkland also act in an exagerrated, campy manner. This might lead some viewers to think of this as a vanity project. And while it is true that it wasn't commercially successful, and was certainly made with its own particular aesthetic, it is still a real movie. The sets are obviously sets, the plot is wandering and picaresque, the thematic connection between the different scenes is unclear, but all of that is an artistic choice, not just because a bunch of stoned actors were making it up as they go along. I think. This film is quirky, kitschy, and not for everyone, but it showed real artistic development and has a consistent, if unrealistic feeling to its presentation. This is even highlighted in a "dream sequence" where Lionel Hitch, while knocked unconscious working on a car, imagines himself as...Neil Young, and where his body language and voice return to normal, as well as the camera work suddenly being realistic. In other words, even though not everyone would like it, this movie does have its own consistent feeling, that works on some level.
There were two things about this movie that were most noteworthy for me. The first, is that as a Neil Young fan who has been listening to his music for decades, I saw something new. I saw that Neil Young could be funny. I had known that his music could have its bizarre and surreal moments, as in Sedan Delivery, but this is where I saw that Neil Young--- the conscience of rock music --- also wrote a movie that had scenes where an overweight woman getting out of a car causes the car to bounce upwards, where two people repeating the word "Who?" confuses a nearby owl (which might not be what it seems), where a man drops a wrench on his foot--- all slapstick comedy of the most simple variety. And how easily Neil Young got into this humorous character makes me realize that the serious Neil Young of his music is just as much a character. Not an inauthentic character, but that is just part of his stage persona.
Another historically important part of this film is that it stars Dean Stockwell, Dennis Hopper, Charlotte Stewart and Russ Tamblyn: all actors who would star in films by David Lynch. Stewart had already done so, in Eraserhead, while the others would be picked up by Lynch later. By chance, I saw this movie slightly after I watched "Blue Velvet", a movie that also has Stockwell and Hopper playing an employee and a boss---in a very different situation. Some of the symbolism in the movie, such as the bird motiffs, also seem to be Lynchian. So it seems like an odd and interesting note that Lynch might have taken some of his career direction from a slapstick buddy comedy made by Neil Young.