I just watched this "documentary". I'm at a loss for words to express anything good about this piece... Which can only be described as a high school quality, steaming pile of sh!t. It pains me to say something so harsh about a documentary, because I usually love documentaries. I don't usually write reviews, but felt it necessary to warn others who might want to learn about Philip K. Dick. This low budget mistake is a dis-service and will turn watchers off to PKD through sheer boredom- which I can only assume is the exact opposite of what the producers had originally intended. Speaking of producers... Mark Steensland and Andy Massagli give credit to themselves no less than 6 TIMES EACH in the opening/closing credits for this festering ball of cat vomit . One of them lists himself as "Camera Director"... Which consists entirely of placing a camera on a tripod with seemingly no regard for lighting, then making sure that camera NEVER moves. Bravo. Unrated and uninteresting, this is an hour and 21 minutes I can't get back. Not only that, but what a horrible loogey to hock on such a great writer as PKD. Thanks a lot. In contrast, the episode of Prophets of Science Fiction dedicated to PKD is excellent! And the camera moves. And Ridley Scott doesn't credit himself 6 times... Although, he deserves it far more than these hacks. Thank you, drive-thru.
... View MoreI found this documentary great... I don't know what you guys are all moaning about. The cartoon portion of Dick with his actual voice from archive tapes is great. These were just fans, let me see some of you do a better job! I give it a 10 out of 10 because what made Phil K Dick was his mind... and these guys focus on the transcending event of Phil's LIFE! I remember a few years after I watched this i considered finding God. And it was this testimony that led me to reading the Gospel and asking God to be real to me. Nothing happened so I just kept asking for the Holy Spirit, which Phil K Dick received the moment that girl walked up to his door with the Jesus necklace. I kept asking and reading the gospel in secret.. alone, no church, just my room. Three weeks later I was overtaken by a love freight train. I felt like I was either stuck in a permanent dream or dead and in heaven, then the visions of Jesus came, of heaven, of hell and Satan, angels in my room... ITS all real folks... IF SOMEONE wants GOD revealed, just ASK that out loud and ask GOD in Jesus name for the HOLY Spirit, the Living Water... and read the new testament as you remain pure for a time not partaking in the world. Thanks Phil K Dick for helping me see the LIGHT! Thanks filmmakers for making this movie! Thank you God for Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit for those who do not JUDGE the word and give it a chance remaining objective! ANYONE has questions on my visions, how to find God, etc... lemme know: djvalis AT gmail dot com
... View MoreWhile I enjoyed listening to the handful of people that are interviewed, this is a seriously shoddy effort. No other documentary filmmaker is going to be in fear of being overshadowed by Mark Steensland. He has no narration, no biographical information, no archival footage (of which I have seen and know of PKD on a couple of talkshows), nothing to cut away to from the talking heads, and when he does show a magazine cover and article header they are flashed so quickly that you don't even have a chance to see it without hitting the freezeframe button and not even a PHOTOGRAPH of the man on the box or in the "film"! There are a couple of sound-bites from a wealth of taped interviews that are played with a poorly animated cartoon PKD lip-synching along. This animated PKD also serves to break up the material into sections with looooong animations of him getting paper, inserting it in a typewriter, typing a bit, pulling the paper out of the typewriter and laying the sheet down with one sentence on it. This repeated three times to complete the preface to the section. After seeing this animated sequence that makes South Park look like the height of technological wizardry, it wears REALLY thin. I had to resort to fast forwarding through the animations to get on with the damn thing. Still, the interviews were semi-cool - except for the real lack of information they provide and the somewhat derogatory way in which they are presented. Steensland claims to be a fan, but obviously has no interest in providing any back ground, history, or any details about Dick's life, except for a handfull of moments that portray him as a drug-addled lunatic. This should have been an incredible tribute and biography of a brilliant man, but it is neither. It's so poorly done that it makes the entire documentary genre look bad and will not make anyone want to read Dick's books if they haven't already.
... View MorePKD is a good subject for a documentary, but this piece is hampered by a lack of visual stimulus, a slow-starting narrative, and especially an overload of silly graphics.The content starts getting intriguing and compelling about half-way through, but it takes some time to get there, a shame, since it seems that there is plenty of material to start off this direction at a much earlier point. In addition to this, there is a sequence of CGI that is repeated again and again, that is painful to watch, but is unrelenting. Although removing it would make this a very short documentary, it is cruel to leave in.All that said, if you're a fan, you might as well watch it, there is plenty of interest, especially if you thought Jason Koornick was a spazz in grade school.
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