Altered States
I finally had a chance to watch Altered States recently, a very silly film. Or as Roger Ebert says, “a superbly silly movie”. Still, he gives the movie much more props than I might have. On Rotten Tomatoes, the overall rating is remarkably high at 87%. I think it is summed up well due to it being “extraordinarily daring for a Hollywood film,” which is true enough. Still a very silly film.
Starring William Hurt along with Blair Brown’s saucy buttocks (freeze frame!), the film took a turn for the better when Charles Haid made the scene playing the trucker/drill seargent/scientist (Ahm a gawddamn Harvard perfesser o’ Endercrinawlogy. Now y’all get thee hale owt o’ mah lab!).
It’s clear to see how certain scenes were inspired by the trippy ending sequences of 2001, and certainly itself was and inspiration for Lynch’s Dune as well as Jacob’s Ladder starring Tim Robbins. Retrospectively a central fact in Frank Herbert’s epic Dune saga –the “other memory” obtained by Bene Gesserit sisters, and later by their male Kwisatz Haderach– could possibly have been an inpiration for Altered States. But so might have Reefer Madness, for surely, there is no way in hell that simply by ingesting hallucinogens and floating around in an isolation tank will you ever possibly turn into an Australopithicus. It’s not so much science-fiction as it is science-poetry.
A cute, but very, very silly film. Two non-opposing thumbs up!