Friday | September 6, 2024 7:00 pm

The Trip

New 35mm print

Directed by Roger Corman.
With Jack Nicholson, Susan Strasberg, Bruce Dern.
US, 1967, 35mm, color, 85 min.
Print source: Academy Film Archive

Independent film pioneer Roger Corman’s The Trip marks one of the earlier forays into psychedelic narrative filmmaking. Written by Jack Nicholson and featuring the likes of Peter Fonda, Bruce Dern, Susan Strasberg and Dennis Hopper, The Trip carries audiences through the psychedelic journey of finding oneself through chemically aided introspection. Corman reportedly took LSD himself to prepare for the making of this film, and he used his experiences to cinematically simulate the moods, sounds and visions felt on the drug. With artful shots, trippy visual sequences, groovy settings and innovative camera movements, Corman was widely known for making shoestring-budget cult films that leave lasting impressions on viewers and the box office. As one of American International Pictures’ most successful releases, The Trip cost around $100,000 to make and grossed a whopping $6 million during its initial run. Released during the “Summer of Love,” The Trip was not only inspired by psychedelia, but made its own cultural reverberations and generated a new wave of drug-induced Hollywood films to follow. – Alexandra Vasile

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PRECEDED BY

The Mind-Benders: LSD and the Hallucinogens

Directed by Lee R. Bobker.
US, 1967, DCP, color, 25 min.
DCP source: National Archives

Presented by the Food and Drug Administration of the United States Department of Health, Education & Welfare, The Mind-Benders attempts to present a critical exploration into the use of LSD and other hallucinogens through interviews with everyday people who have experienced psychedelic drugs in varying capacities, along with psychiatrists and a representative from the Bureau of Drug Abuse Control. With its trippy opening and closing sequences including atonal sounds and flickering, experimental imagery, it is not completely apparent that the film was meant to serve as anti-drug propaganda. Interviewees recount both positive and negative experiences of taking LSD, ranging from feelings of euphoria to intense fear. Though intended as an anti-drug educational film, The Mind-Benders’ appropriation of elements of the avant-garde unintentionally situate the work in the realm of the “head film.” – Alexandra Vasile