Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Scanialara You won't be disappointed!

Grimerlana Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Dalbert Pringle OK. Here's 1967's "The Trip" summed up 4 U in a total psychedelic nutshell. Totally.A total square takes some LSD.... The total square hallucinates (like a total f-u-c-k).... The total square is now transformed into a total hipster.... (And, that is the total end of the total story)Roll credits.Now, I don't know about you - But, in the days of my reckless youth - I certainly did my fair share of dropping acid (LSD). And I'll tell you one thing for sure - I never, ever came even close to hallucinating like this dude did. Never.You know, I really, really wonder (back in the glory days of "Flower Power") just how many gullible thrill-seekers saw this film, fell for its "say-yes-to-drugs" propaganda, tried some LSD, expected to be enlightened by some mind-altering experiences, and ended up being completely deflated and disillusioned by the promising hype of a psychedelia that never delivered.P.S. - Wait till you see this film's unintentionally hilarious "laundromat" scene. It'll totally kill you.

chriskirk_filmmaker Less a depiction of the experience of taking acid than an example of the sort of film you might make if you are on acid throughout the writing, shooting and editing process. This really is a humourless montage of meaningless associations and trippy images that you would need to be deeply and thoroughly acculturated to appreciate.Staring at a flower or a centipede for an hour will be a closer simulation of an acid experience.

ShadeGrenade In the early '80's, Roger Corman gave a talk at the British Film Institute, where he was interviewed by 'Guardian' critic Derek Malcolm. He then fielded questions from the audience. One of these concerned his 1967 film 'The Trip'.Although the then-unknown Jack Nicholson was credited as writer, Corman pointed out that he himself had had input into the script, particularly with regards to the drug scenes. He had used L.S.D., as had Dennis Hopper ( one of the cast ), and their various experiences were incorporated into the film.Spotting the then-head of the British Board of Film Censors - the late James Ferman - in the audience, Malcolm asked him why the B.B.F.C. had twice refused 'The Trip' a certificate. Ferman said he felt the film was an incitement to drug use ( even though other movies featuring drugs were passed without any difficulty whatever ). In 2003 it was finally deemed fit for British audiences.'The Trip' begins with a portentous disclaimer warning the audience about the risks involved in taking L.S.D. Then we see a bride and groom standing on water. No, the trip has not yet started. It is for a television commercial. Paul Groves ( Peter Fonda ), the director, is going through an unhappy time with his divorce to Sally ( Susan Strasberg ) almost complete. He approaches drug dealer John ( a bearded Bruce Dern ) and asks him for L.S.D. as he wants to find out about himself.So Paul swallows the pill and the madness begins. Over the course of seventy-five minutes, he sees kaleidoscopic visions, is chased along a beach by masked figures on horseback, strolls naked through woods with some attractive ( equally naked ) women, is put on trial by Dennis Hopper, and generally has a pretty weird time of it.John initially acts as a minder, stopping Paul from jumping out of the window ( the house is high up on a hill ), but then Paul escapes, and sees the world as a entirely different place. In one excellent scene, he wanders along a street at night and the neon shop signs take on a particularly menacing quality. As he spends most of the movie in a drug-induced haze ( which is after all the point ) it is difficult to praise Fonda's acting. Susan Strasberg is woefully underused, while Salli Sachse is drop dead gorgeous as the drug dealer's girlfriend.James H.Nicholson and Samuel Z.Arkoff apparently intended this as an anti-drug film, but a section of the audience saw it differently, and smoked certain substances during screenings, as they later did with Kubrick's '2001'. Anyone expecting another 'Reefer Madness' will be disappointed though, it is not bad enough to be that.The film proved successful enough to spawn a sequel of sorts - 1968's 'Psych-Out', directed by Richard Rush, which also featured Susan Strasberg and Bruce Dern ( with Jack Nicholson as one of the cast ). I prefer the latter because, unlike 'The Trip', it has a plot.I agree with the commentator who said that the hallucinatory sequences lose their impact or so after a while and the film becomes tough to sit through. Cynthia Lennon, in her book 'A Twist Of Lennon, said that taking L.S.D. was the most frightening experience of her life. I have not used the stuff ( the nearest I got was Barratt's Sherbert Fountain! ) so cannot comment, but if 'The Trip' is to be believed, I do not think I ever will either.We are far from those times now, when people had abstract paintings on their walls, wore colourful clothes, and ended every sentence with 'man'. A modern audience might have difficulty trying to distinguish between the drug scenes and those set in the real world. Interesting then mainly as a curio.

MisterWhiplash I'm not sure to recommend The Trip as a great look at the psychedelia times of the late 60s, and if it serves any purpose for today. It's now forty years (strange to think it's been that long), and it holds resonance only in that it could provide some with a look at how to do a really trashy art-film with no real moral code to identify, and for the nostalgia of the cast and writer of the project. Corman even admits on the DVD that he tried to take a neutral position to LSD for the audience, despite the opening warning, which was probably a given for the exploitation-nature of AIP at the time, and that Corman really didn't have too many bad things to say about his own trip when he tried LSD. So the film only slightly gives an endorsement for the drug, but not really at the same time- on the one hand one might look at the initial reasoning for Peter Fonda's character Paul to take the drug, that it might open him up and that he might learn something about himself. On the other hand, one might also question as to whether or not complete distortion of reality, insane montages, figures in black cloaks riding on horses, and moments of death coupled with paranoia and occasional sexual joys all colored in psychedelia is worth it.In a way, Corman still has a little of the horror aspects of his 60s Edgar Allan Poe pictures running through here, only through a Tim Leary sensibility. But it's also Corman trying something new, and through a screenwriter, Jack Nicholson, who had taken the drug quite a number of times by then (having read bits of Nicholson's biography, and just looking at his work at this time period, culminating to Easy Rider, shows how much Nicholson was into this culture and time in America). But there's something else too that's intriguing, which is the personal connection of Nicholson's marriage, divorce, and sexual appetite working it's way into the film. They're really some of the best scenes in the film, where ambiguity is worked in with Fonda's severed relationship with his soon to be divorced ex, and how this comes into a big part of his trip (we see some overtly f****-ed up sex scenes, with manic lighting effects and special post-production work included by the great Allan Daviau). Another very fine scene with a darkly comic touch comes when Fonda, wandering a California city after his guide (Bruce Dern, with an awesome beard) loses him, wanders into a laundromat and nearly gets freaky with either/or the woman waiting for her laundry, or the laundry itself.Actually, most of the Trip is freaky, and usually in that quick, cheap Roger Corman style that ends up working more to its advantage than I figured at first. Surrealism, to be sure, isn't really Corman's forte, but he does what he can with making this a whacked-out look at LSD. It's a drug I've never taken, so I can't say whether the film comes close to what an actual 'trip' is really like or not. And this causes sort of a problem for most to watch the film- it captures a 'side' to what a trip must be like, and all in the space of the picture's 80 minute running time. It also ends on a pretty inconclusive note following too much random montage and clips back to earlier in the film (as Paul is supposed to be coming down off the drug). But it was a lot of fun, as mentioned, in a trashy way to see how Corman and Nicholson decided to approach a lot of the hallucinations and visions. Obvious maybe, sure, but the tongue-in-cheek is also shown in a light of this being not too far from being how a trip might actually take hold. And there are two sides to the interest of this trip in Corman's style, how he goes from his standard set-ups in a scene with dialog, like when Paul goes into a random house and gets milk for a little girl, or when Paul first gets into the city and (under fantastic 2nd unit shooting by Dennis Hopper, who also is great as a guru type stoner) we see everything becoming wild and choppy and with music that goes oddly jazzy.The Trip is a capsule that only somewhat delivers a good enough look into the drug community, and more so into the psychology of its writer (who probably took on escapism and promiscuity at the time), and of the chances the filmmaker wanted to take with the subject matter. Far from being really sensational, and it gets nowhere near 2001: A Space Odyssey for visual virtuosity or Easy Rider for a more potent look at the culture and at subjective surrealism. But it's some good fun, and the whole AIP gang made such ambitious collages of items to see and with a delirious Fonda performance that it doesn't out-run its welcome. Cool music by the American Band too.