It's a crazy, mixed up world and we are thankful for movies, sans The Tooth Fairy, that offer proof. Weekend Weirdness cocks its disoriented head to examine such flicks, whether it's a new trailer for a provocative indie, an interview, or a mini review.
In this installment: a look at the new DVD Know Your Mushrooms, a breezy doc on fungi, of the magic variety and otherwise, with music by The Flaming Lips; the latest news on The Human Centipede, the increasingly nefarious, pukey ass-to-mouth horror flick now officially on its way to the States; a new Public Access dvd from Beastie Boys' pal Ricky Powell; Brooklyn premiere parties, a Michael Cera music video, and more! Btw: The above family portrait, inspired by my number one film of 2009, Observe & Report, is the latest work in a series by artist and /Film fave Kirk Demarais. Buy it so I can steal it and cruise to Mexico blasting Little River Band's "Help Is On Its Way" in a hot-wired raffle convertible.
Know Your Mushrooms: Edible Late Night Fluff
The documentary, Know Your Mushrooms, simultaneously met and dipped below my expectations. It's a film that aspires to sincerely inform on the titular fungi and playfully revel and explore the history and reputation of psilocybin as a psychedelic. It never goes quite far enough in either direction, which lends a slacker charm that's semi-befitting. But as late night laptop fare? One could do a lot worse. There are silly animated interludes featuring a multiple-choice screen and a boyant, 'shroom mascot and slick Wii-like sprinkling star trail graphics. Half-way in, I realized that 'shroom porn could be a genre; a fascinating and educational niche with none of the embarrassment of, say, staring at huge nug' pin-ups in High Times.
Considering that I have a girlfriend, and have no current need for Faye Reagan, I could be up for watching more 'shroom porn on the late night; observing professional "mushroom hunters" with Jerry-beards stumbling around Oregon and Colorado forests seeking well "gilled" specimen for their compartmentalized collections. The main hunter in the doc, an articulate and sane man named Larry Evans, sees mushrooms as "free food" and has lead a life demystifying the picking-of-mushrooms as risky and esoteric. Sure, some naturally grown mushrooms are poisonous, but countless others are medicinal, nutritious, and delicious. Others are a fine chemical-free alternative for turning paper white, and still others are used to soak up oil in massive ocean spills. Climb the stem of enlightenment and wear the cap of a convert. (Evans never says that, but he should have.)
It's to the credit of director, Ron Mann, who is drawn to "counter culture" topics (see Grass) but not a full blown hippie revivalist, that Mushrooms doesn't reek of patchouli. In addition to the animation ditties, he intersperses weird 'shroom-related clips from Japanese cult films and old PSAs. These clips were compiled by Mann for past research on drugs film history and played an integral role in the doc coming together. It was via the suggestion and inspiration of Mann's pal, fellow silver-fox indie director, Jim Jarmusch (who's evidently a fungi enthusiast) that he decided to make it.
Too briefly discussed in the film are the thoughts of late intellectual, Terence McKenna, who believed that magic mushrooms were vital to the origins of human civilization. (He proposed that way back when our ancestors discovered that in small doses, 'shrooms strengthened eyesight and worked as an aphrodisiac. In high doses they established hallucinogenic conceptions of god and spirituality.) Rather than work as a definitive look on 'shrooms—hopefully someone eventually makes that—the film is a primer and a refresher of their mere existence in the wild. (I had somehow forgotten about the theories that Santa Claus, flying reindeer, and Christmas trees were directly influenced by tripping.) Enjoy the film, and the nice track made for it by The Flaming Lips, and then chase it with a nap and a visit to Wikipedia.
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