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List Price: $9.98 | | Label: Warner Home Video
Salesrank: 18088
Released: June 1, 2004 |
| Our Price: $3.69 |
| Used Price: $1.67 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Hurt plays a scientist obsessed with discovering the realities of other states of consciousness.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: R
Release Date: 1-JUN-2004
Media Type: DVD
Description of Altered States:
It's easy to understand why the late, great screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky removed his name from the credits of Altered States and substituted the pseudonym Sidney Aaron. After all, Chayefsky was a revered dramatist whose original source novel was intended as a serious exploration of altered consciousness, inspired by the immersion-tank experiments of Dr. John Lilly in the 1970s. In the hands of maverick director Ken Russell, however, Altered States became a full-on sensory assault, using symbolic imagery and mind- blowing special effects to depict one man's physical and hallucinatory journey through the entire history of human evolution. It's a brazenly silly film redeemed by its intellectual ambition--a dazzling extravaganza that's in love with science and scientists, and eagerly willing to dive off the precipice of rationality to explore uncharted regions of mind, body, and spirit. William Hurt made his bold film debut as the psycho-physiologist who plays guinea pig to his own experiments; Blair Brown plays his equally brilliant wife, whose devotion is just strong enough to bring him back from the most altered state imaginable. From the eternal channels of sense memory to the restorative power of a loving embrace, this movie rocks you to the birth of the universe and back again. And while it's clearly not the story that Chayefsky wanted on the screen, the directorial audacity of Ken Russell makes it one heck of a memorable trip. --Jeff Shannon
Altered States Reviews:
one of the most important and fascinating films ever made 
2009-12-09 - This movie is one-of-a-kind and it's a shame that no movies since produced have matched its spirit of creativity. I have nothing but complete and utter praise for every aspect of this movie, and I shall elaborate comprehensively.
The casting is incredible, as other reviewers have noted. Even the schizophrenic girl has a magic, stunning quality to her, religious and transcendent like alex grey's dmt art or downright frightening like Linda Blair. William Hurt is superb.
Even though he's existing within specific constructs in his role, somehow, to me, the entire range of his personality seems to come across in his presence. Although nowhere referenced, I feel the entire cultural pulse of the 70s, 80s and 90s, informing my feelings while watching this film. I feel the intergenerational energy, of university campuses and family communities. The I think this sense of importance and context agrees with the intentions of this film. There are a few scenes, as well, whose cinematographic quality amplifies this sense, beyond the stiff confines of life in New York State. The get-together shindig, specifically the corridor scene, in which Dr. Jessup and Emily first meet, is one of those scenes. It speaks of the cultural techno funnel of the 80s and 90s, of the aforementioned intergenerational energy. It's well connected and foreshadows the ultimate, climactic hallway scene in the movie, an ending for some reason scoffed at by some individuals, especially reviewers on this website, but that I find to be one of the most profound and moving scenes in any movies, to be a fundamental statement about psychedelic truths and humanity. A reviewer on this website, a supposed veteran of the psychedelic age--I have a lot of skepticism for such individuals, it should be noted (so many of these so called veterans have failed to translate any progress for future generations, a titanic failure in my opinion)--spoke of the false belief in the capacity of psychedelics for learning, betterment and progress. While the answer is certainly not a sure-fire Yes, I think this is opinion is an idiotic oversimplification. The movie does a great job in addressing this issue, and I'll talk more about this later.
Another great scene that speaks of vast cultural context are the house scenes in the height of summer. Apparently, Dr. Jessup and Emily managed to obtain some real estate w/ great country charm, a quintessential purple-mountain-majesties, sea-to-shining-sea house. Dr. Jessup's optimistic spiel about the untapped power of genetic memory, against this transcendent americana backdrop, is especially poetic. Perhaps genetic memory, of psychedelic american owls in the dawn of the great summer sun, is a leap of spiritual faith, but metaphorically speaking, the memory of humanity, at least a couple of great American generations back, if not thousands of years back, is not a "leap" of faith. It's a real and inspiring thing. Art can save us and help channel this memory and humanity, and to lose belief in this is to lose hope altogether.
Hurt as Dr. Jessup is likeable from the start, from the moment his assistant Arthur brings him out from a psychonautic salt tank setup and he starts blabbering enthusiastically, the adventuresome spirit is infectious. The delivery of his impressions during salt tank trips are astonishingly effective. One can imagine how easily the sensation and believability could have failed miserably with even the slightest difference in delivery and in the hands of a less skilled actor, and a lot of props should be given for these. They're among my favorite scenes in the movie and some of the most simple, yet effective, acoustically. The movie is at times terrifying, but also delightfully hilarious, and the scene of Jessup's first primordial flashback--in the truly Lillian, black-box isolation tank--in the company of Arthur and the highly esteemed, supervisor endocrinologist Dr. Mason, illustrates this. To be fair, the visual poetry of the shots in this scene contribute to its effects.
Some have compared this movie to other sci-fi films, like The Fly, or what have you, but none of those films are as important and symbolically cogent as Altered States. The visuals in this film are not merely stunning or dazzling; they're utterly accurate and truly communicative. Jessup's first salt tank hallucination--unaided by drugs--poignantly conveys the multidimensional nature of pain through overwhelming christ-images and multi-eyed mountain goats. The visuals of Jessup's first amanita muscaria experience convey the sensoral electricity and sensoral overload of certain drug states, as well as the sensation of dying, ego-loss and entering the void sometimes associated with certain powerful psychedelics, through a frightening,naturalistic-death-cult extravaganza visual parade. The interspersed images of constrictor snakes, conveys another aspect of sensations sometimes associated with powerful psychedelic experiences.
The film may and may not be accurate in its depiction of amanita muscaria. Last time I checked, Amanita Muscaria was noteable for its ibotenic acid and muscimol content, and NOT belladona/nightshade type alkaloids, like atropin and scopalamine, as Jessup's translator and guide in the Mexican highlands explicitly states. Perhaps this was intended to amplify the death-cult effect of the first Amanita trip in the film. I never even noticed this until one of my subsequent viewings of the film--at that point, the translator's speeches and the expositions of the head ceremonial brujo took on a terrifying forebearing tone.
I found the land of giants/victorian picnic imagery interspersed in the first Amanita trip sequence to hit the nail on the head. Cut into such a terrifying void-type experience, the mischmasch captures the psychological dialectic that could be called believable and accurate. Both for plot development/story arc and as an accurate picture of the psyche, this juxtaposition of americana ideals and the redemptive potential of love, of that other important person, is par excellence.
As I mentioned before, I think the love story arc is pivotal in the mix of psychedelics and humanity. Dr. Jessup's
reservation in affection is not without purpose. It's essential to the revelation at the culmination of the movie. Endocrinal primate regression I found to be a fantastic, surprising, original yet believable direction. But I also found the final transformations to be believable. Cellular level activities are all around us. At this level, the unwavering, cruel and primordial nature of living life, is visible in the proximity of inorganic and organic forces to each other. This is a good explanation for the significance of love. It is the expression of humanity, of compassion and mutual relief, that allows us to transcend the cruel physical realities of existence. I, personally, have acquaintance with trips into the cellular, molecular and inorganic voids, from unaided visions in early childhood, to later, LSD-enabled insights. I have wondered about the sequencing of human civilization, of instincts of satiation and lust, especially in a world full of so many people. But I have also myself glimpsed something so extraordinarly wholesome, beautiful and humanistic--if only briefly--thanks to the other psychotropically enlightened member of mycelium. The depths of my human system reverberated in such a fashion as to appreciate the unbroken thread of life connecting me to ancestors on the European plains, a reverberation that confirmed to me that all those individuals in the chain, felt the same way, rising and deflating, and crying out to their brethren, in their life miracles. I had glimpsed the existence of a tribe, through which the expression of humanity could be found, in my ancestral past, and gained insight into my contemporary journey in trying to
find my true tribe against the backdrop of an often nonsensical, molecular sensory electronic societal machine. There are good people out there, and it is this communal social quest that is the road to the satisfaction of our humanity.
The movie's indirect references to John C. Lilly and Dr. Richart Alpert are a good starting point in the debate in the role of psychedelics in learning, betterment and progress.
Ultimately, it is up to our good judgement, knowledge and human qualities that determine whether the insights gained from psychedelic experience can be translated into productive and worthwhile endeavours. Educated, thoughtful and determined individuals, talented in a broad array of disciplines, and those with well developed communication capacities--particularly artists--are in the best position to make use of psychedelic experiences and not waste them. Despite the pretensions of so-called "veterans" of the psychedelic era, I feel more often than not, too many of these folks wasted their experiences. Some reviewers on this website have tried to cursorily relegate the visual aesthetics of this movie to the already perfected pop-psychedelic art of their era. In fact, the notion of artistic perfection in "psychedelic" art from this era is a complete myth. I feel a lot of the art from that age fails miserably to even scratch the surface of psychedelic experience, let alone convey it. One must keep in mind that the psychedelic experience, in its significance and splendor, cannot be conveyed by anything less than the artist who understands life and the human experience in all its significance and splendor. Furthermore, technologies since then, especially since the 90s, have advanced quite a bit. The promise and potential of artistic communication and human understanding is greater than it has ever been.
The work of the two aforementioned, seminal psychedelic scientists, illuminates the multiple facets, the promises and challenges of translating psychedelic experiences into progress. For Dr. Richard Alpert, a very distinguished Psychologist of his time, psychedelics reinforced his convictions that, from the standpoint of the advancement of humanity and psychological science, the academic field was failing miserably, in its intellectual paradigms and in the mindless bureaucratic structures of academia. The movie partially touched upon these views, and I still believe they hold true, although since Richard Alpert's time, innumerous progress has been made in the field of neuroscience--the real scientific hope in the objective reference and measurement of emotional and conscious states (i.e. human experience). But, furthermore, unlike some of his psychedelic scientific peers of the age, I'm sure you know, Richard Alpert continued his journey, seeking psychological and humanistic progress, beyond the aid of drugs, journeying to India and engaging in various spiritual traditions. This, I agree with highly. Psychedelics are simply one method. They are an important method, but the real crux of the work lies on the shoulders of physiological, artistic and psychological advancement--using methods, that improve productivity and quality of life, that many people fail to practice: full-body exercise, comprehensive art, self-reflection and reflections of various sorts, as well as morals, and analysis of the human life and social machine. As individuals, we would all do well to learn from the practices of the Buddha, or the enlightened administration of Ashoka the Great, a Buddhist-inspired ancient king.
Nonetheless, the movie is so original and profound because the creative spirit and optimism, epitomized by Dr. Jessup, we have rarely since seen. Very few movies produced since, I feel, have explored such creative territories, and the same might be true in some ways for science. John C. Lilly really represented this creative spirit, in his groundbreaking research with Dolphins, and, for a brief period of time, LSD in isolation tanks. The brief renaissance of dolphin research, to me, seemed to be a tragic metaphor for the failure of our society and academic communities to truly attain and translate an understanding of the creative powers of each individual, into a more humane and fulfilling societal structure (see Karen C. Pryor's 1969 experiment, "The Creative Porpoise: Training for Novel Behavior."
Especially since society at large is ignorant of the therapeutic and progressive potential of psychedelics, those individuals of the past generation and present--especially in positions of authority--possessing psychedelic experience, are all the more obligated towards doing a better job. The so-called veterans would do well to learn from the examples of Richard Alpert and John C. Lilly, and at least from the enthusiasm and ultimate humanity of Dr. Jessup's character in this movie. Hell, how many of you LSD users out there ever gave a moments thought to the countless individuals whose lives were nightmarishly ended in the last apocalypse of the Second World War? aka The Holocaust? much less the genocidal, psychedelic nightmares that have continued to plague human society since? After all, LSD was synthesized in Central Europe at the dawn of the Second World War, at the very time the forces of death were in motion...
The failure of you old-timers to translate psychedelic knowledge into progress is not only pathetic, but your stubbornly held opinions about the futility of psychedelic experience is narrow-minded, completely selfish and utterly irresponsible. You were given the visionary blessing of psychedelic priviledge and failed to make any use of it, or even consider the possibility that there are those out there who would do anything to have the slightest bit of foresight to save them from doom.
Solitary Man 
2009-10-12 - William Hurt makes a memorable film debut as research scientist Eddie Jessup in this Ken Russell masterpiece. Jessup works with schizophrenics and is constantly amazed by their alleged religious experiences during hypnosis. Hoping to gain first hand experience, Jessup starts experimenting with an isolation tank housed in the basement of a hospital. Closely monitored by his friend and assistant (Bob Balaban) Jessup goes back in time and relives painful memories such as the death of his father and has his own religious experiences. Eddie meets a fellow Ph.D named Emily (Blair Brown) at a party and the two hit it off. Both are intense and inquisitive and they eventually marry and start a family. However, Jessup wants to take his experiments further so he leaves Emily and their two kids so that he can travel to Mexico and take part in a shaman's ceremony. Jessup is given some powerful and unidentified drugs in liquid form and his hallucinations become more dangerous and possibly deadly. When he returns stateside, with the still unidentified drug, he combines his new find with the isolation tank and things turn into a living nightmare for Jessup and those around him. Without revealing any of the horrors that follow, I'll only say that Emily has begun studying primates in their natural habitat and she may not have to go far to study her subjects. Hurt is hypnotic as Jessup making Eddie a dreamer who is determined at all costs to literally go deeper into himself and find out all about man and himself in the process. Brown is quite attractive and is just as intense as Hurt. She does a good job of capturing the pain and fear of a woman who loves her husband but is forced to watch him succumb to his demons and then worry about what he's capable of doing next. The film has amazing visuals, particularly religious imagery. These scenes are both beautiful and frightening at the same time. A well made thriller from Russell based on Paddy Chayefsky's novel. Chayefsky wrote the screenplay, but since he was displeased with Russell's handling of his material he demanded to be credited as Sidney Aaron, his pen name.
Judy
2009-09-14 - A very interesting movie. One you really need to pay attention to.
Rent one, and if you like it, I recomend you buy it for you video library.
Mind-altering!
2009-06-13 - When I was a kid I loved reading the bizarre books by Carlos Casteneda. This movie was actually kind of close to some of Carlos's experiences. One of my stranger favorites.
Great Imagery 
2009-03-31 - This movie is one of my favorite as far as the imagery is concerned. The hallucination scenes were way ahead of there time and the whole thing looks and sounds fantastic on my 47" TV.
