Countless artists, whether they be musicians, filmmakers, actors, painters, or writers, have found inspiration through psychedelic trips over the years. Trip experiences are personal, yet uniting; scary, yet beautiful; and complex, yet shockingly simple at their core. Trying to capture it is like harnessing lightning in a bottle, but it hasn’t stopped many of these artists from giving it a go. Fortunately, some of them have found success.
There are many, many more incredible movies and TV shows that pay homage to the beauty (and darkness) of psychedelics and other drugs – Requiem for a Dream, Easy Rider, Have a Good Trip, and A Field in England, to name just a few. An even broader amount of films and TV shows are psychedelic in nature, like Adventure Time, The Midnight Gospel, or Adult Swim’s Off the Air series on YouTube. There is something for every type of mind traveler, no matter where you’re from or what you use psychedelics for.
Whether you watch psychedelic movies while tripping yourself or cue them up to try and imagine what it’s like, there is no denying that film has allowed these substances to reach a far broader audience than they were able to do before. Every person who has helped create these scenes – from the camera operators, to the sound engineers, to the visual effects artists, to the actors themselves – has instilled a little bit of their own magic into it, allowing the audience to share in the trip as one. And that, truly, is the most psychedelic element of all.
Emily Mullins | Community Blogger at Chemical Collective
Emily is one of our community bloggers here at Chemical Collective. If you’re interested in joining our blogging team and getting paid to write about subjects you’re passionate about, please reach out to Sam via email at samwoolfe@gmail.com
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