DREAMS (1990) by Akira Kurosawa

🍄🫠🏖 Psychedelic Summer - Part Three: Can I Play With Madness?

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Ahoy folks! As mentioned on the WhatsApp group, I [Steve] will be taking a break from discussions again (jaw stuff). I'll continue from the sidelines a la Oracle (Babs Gordon, anyone?) with my scheduled programming and join back in the fray once I get some much needed orthodontic relief 😬 (hopefully by late September, after my next adjustment).

This week we'll be delving into Akira Kurosawa's DREAMS (1990).

How DREAMS relates to the psychedelic experience, to state the immediately obvious, is its correlation to dreams and the dream-like states psychedelics induce (nightmares included, unfortunately). The psychedelic experience is often compared to dreams and dream-logic, particularly for the vivid, eclectic, and seemingly non-sensical nature as to how they unfold. It's later, during the integration period days, weeks, and months after the journey, that we can begin to unpack and make sense of what came up for us.

Less obvious, DREAMS for me is a great cinematic representation of the "Plateau" stage of the psychedelic journey (I'm strictly refering to Psilocybin usage here). The Plateau stage occurs roughly between hours two to four, just after you've reached the Peak stage (hours one to two).

It's during the Plateau stage that the high begins to settle down a bit. We feel less overwhelmed and start to become one with the experience. For me personally, the Plateau is the most fruitful part of the journey. Insights start to present themselves. What we experienced during the Peak starts making some sense (unless you're having a bad trip... although I'm like David Lynch when he talks about coffee: "bad coffee is better than no coffee.")

Deep-rooted fears make themselves present in DREAMS, much like they do during the psychedelic experience. It's really up to us how we interpret what we experience and what we transmute our fears into. Let's hope during our journeys, psychedelic or otherwise, that we can tap into the style and grace of our lord and saviour, Akira Kurosawa 🙏🇯🇵🍑

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Join (most of) us Sunday, August 24 at 10am at the Red Brick Cafe for our third discussion of Psychedelic Summer! 🍄🫠🏖

You can stream the film for free on Kanopy, as well as here: https://youtu.be/4jx0qMG_0ss?si=YwYTMDh95rPu8uvw

I'll share some video essays closer to the discussion.

Happy watching! 😴