Meat Loaf: To Hell and Back - Film Version

Film Version

The TV movie version of the book – directed by Jim McBride – is only vaguely faithful to the autobiography itself. Changes which are obvious include showing Meat Loaf as still in Texas - indeed still in high school - when his father comes in, looking sad, and he realises that his mother has died. In addition little is made of his time between leaving Texas and meeting Jim Steinman. A large portion of the film is devoted to the attempts to get Bat out of Hell released and Meat Loaf's alcoholism problems and legal arguments, especially with Steinman. The film ends with Meat performing a concert at a cancer charity event, which Meat agrees to attend due to the death of his mother from cancer. The song "I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)" is sung, initially a cappella, at the very end of the film, when in real life, at the charity, he sang "I'd Lie for You (And That's the Truth)".