Contemplations: On The Psychedelic Experience

NOW ON VOD! You would have to be on drugs to envision transforming a documentary into a hitchhiker’s guide to the outer dimensions. Looks like that was exactly the case with the sky-kissing visionary study Contemplations: On The Psychedelic Experience by Australian Julian Palmer. Palmer is a major figure in the psychedelic multi-verse as he invented the drug Changa, which combines DMT with a monoamine oxidase inhibitor that seems to be derived from Sonoran desert toads to extend the “quick as a shot” DMT trip.

“…sought to create a guidebook on how to navigate the effects of hallucinogens and get the most out of the experience.”

For his filmmaking debut, he sought to create a guidebook on how to navigate the effects of hallucinogens and get the most out of the experience. This is much more serious than making sure head poppers don’t fall off their astral surfboards. Palmer and his fellow travelers believe that these drugs, particularly the naturally occurring ones like mushrooms and DMT, offer humanity profound spiritual insights into existence. He does this through a series of interviews with Australians of all walks of life, from business executives to sorcerers, about the visions they have seen, felt, and were absorbed by while tripping. Palmer then recruited several fantastic animators to bring the trips to life, with as many different visual styles as the many different eyes in the endless columns of light that await beyond.

Palmer divides the film into five chapters: Reflections, Complications, Orientations, Visitations, and Evolutions. You will hear retired businessmen who have never taken any drugs speaking of seeing rainbow serpents. You will also meet activist Greg Kasarik, who kept taking LSD on the steps of Parliament to get the case up to the Supreme Court. Palmer makes good his promise to create a cartography of visions, as this film has excellent advice on interacting with these naturally occurring compounds. Be prepared to be instructed to take off all your clothes and dance for the tree, and don’t come crying to me if you don’t.