''Psych-Out'' is a 1968 American

psychedelic film Psychedelic film is a film genre characterized by the influence of psychedelia and the experiences of psychedelic drugs. Psychedelic films typically contain visual distortion and experimental narratives, often emphasizing psychedelic imagery. Th ...

about

hippie A hippie, also spelled hippy, especially in British English, is someone associated with the counterculture of the 1960s, originally a youth movement that began in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to different countries around ...

psychedelic music Psychedelic music (sometimes called psychedelia) is a wide range of popular music styles and genres influenced by 1960s psychedelia, a subculture of people who used psychedelic drugs such as LSD, psilocybin mushrooms, mescaline, and cannabis to ...

and

recreational drugs Recreation is an activity of leisure, leisure being discretionary time. The "need to do something for recreation" is an essential element of human biology and psychology. Recreational activities are often done for enjoyment, amusement, or pleasur ...

starring

Susan Strasberg Susan Elizabeth Strasberg (May 22, 1938 – January 21, 1999) was an American stage, film, and television actress. Imagined to be the next Hepburn-type ingenue, she was nominated for a Tony Award at age 18, playing the title role in ''The Diary ...

Jack Nicholson John Joseph Nicholson (born April 22, 1937) is an American retired actor and filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of all time. In many of his films, he played rebels against the social structure. He received numerous ...

(the film's leading man despite being billed under supporting player

Dean Stockwell Robert Dean Stockwell (March 5, 1936 – November 7, 2021) was an American actor with a career spanning seven decades. As a child actor under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he first came to the public's attention in films including ''Anchors A ...

) and

Bruce Dern Bruce MacLeish Dern (born June 4, 1936) is an American actor. He has often played supporting villainous characters of unstable natures. He has received several accolades, including the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor and the Silver B ...

. It was produced and released by

American International Pictures American International Pictures (AIP) is an American motion picture production label of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In its original operating period, AIP was an independent film production and distribution company known for producing and releasing fi ...

. The

cinematographer The cinematographer or director of photography (sometimes shortened to DP or DOP) is the person responsible for the photographing or recording of a film, television production, music video or other live action piece. The cinematographer is the ch ...

was László Kovács.

Plot

Jenny is a

deaf Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an Audiology, audiological condition. In this context it ...

runaway who arrives in San Francisco's

Haight-Ashbury Haight-Ashbury () is a district of San Francisco, California, named for the intersection of Haight and Ashbury streets. It is also called The Haight and The Upper Haight. The neighborhood is known as one of the main centers of the counterculture ...

district searching for her brother Steve. She encounters Stoney and his hippie band Mumblin' Jim in a coffee shop. The boys hide her from the police and help her look for her brother. The band is approached by a promoter who arranges for them to perform at a venue called the Ballroom. Artist Warren, who designs the psychedelic posters advertising the band,

freaks out ''Freaks Out'' is a 2021 Italian historical-fantasy drama film directed by Gabriele Mainetti. It was entered in the main competition at the 78th Venice International Film Festival. It received mostly positive reviews, with critics praising the a ...

badly in his gallery. While helping him, Jenny notices a large sculpture resembling abstract flames in a corner and recognizes it as her brother's work. The gallery owner says the artist is known as "The Seeker", an itinerant

preacher A preacher is a person who delivers sermons or homilies on religious topics to an assembly of people. Less common are preachers who preach on the street, or those whose message is not necessarily religious, but who preach components such as a ...

. Ex-band member Dave may know The Seeker's current whereabouts. Dave's information leads the gang to a junkyard, where Jenny recognizes her brother's car. A group of thugs who frequent the junkyard accost the group and threaten to

rape Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or ag ...

Jenny. Violence ensues, and the group barely escape with their lives. In Stoney's crowded home, everyday hippie life is less than ideal. The residents are all involved in contemplation, sex, sleeping, dancing or decorating, but with little cleaning or maintenance. Jenny tries to wash the mountain of dishes in the kitchen and finds that the plumbing is broken. Frustrated, she goes for a walk. Stoney goes to find her and ends up at the art gallery, where he hears breaking glass and slips inside. Steve, AKA The Seeker, has returned to the art gallery to pick up his sculpture. He is glad that Jenny is looking for him, but says he is on drugs and wants to be sober when they meet. He tells Stoney that Jenny's deafness is the result of trauma caused by their abusive mother. The performance at the Ballroom is a success. The Seeker shows up, hoping to see Jenny, but the junkyard thugs chase him back to his home. At an after-show party, Dave offers Jenny a glass of orange juice spiked with

STP STP may refer to: Places * São Tomé and Príncipe (ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 code, IOC country code, and FIFA country code STP) * St Pancras railway station, London St Pancras (Domestic) railway station (National Rail code STP) * St. Paul Downtown Air ...

. Stoney charges in and angrily shouts at Jenny. Heartbroken, Jenny accepts Dave's glass of fruit juice and drinks nearly all of it. Jenny again explains her search for Steve, and Dave pulls a note from his pocket containing an address and the words "God is in the flame." Jenny runs out and takes a

streetcar A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport are ...

to the address, with Stoney and Dave, now

tripping Tripping may refer to: * Psychedelic experience * Tripping (ice hockey), a penalty infraction * Tripping (pipe), the act of running or pulling drill pipe into or out of a wellbore on a drilling rig * "Tripping" (song), a 2005 single by Robbie Wil ...

, close behind. Pursued by the junkyard thugs back to his home, Steve lights a fire inside his shrine. Jenny arrives just in time to see him standing in the middle of the flames, absorbed in prayer; he sees her, but merely smiles and waves. In her grief and confusion, she runs up to the roof, hallucinating wildly, ending up at the middle of the

Golden Gate Bridge The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate, the strait connecting San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. The structure links the U.S. city of San Francisco, California—the northern tip of the San Francisco Pen ...

with cars coming at her from both directions. She holds her hands over her ears, and Dave and Stoney find her. Dave shoves her out of the way of an oncoming car and is struck and killed. As he dies, he murmurs that he hopes this, too, will be a good trip. Sickened and angry, Jenny tries to leave, but Stoney embraces her. The film ends with the two holding each other and crying.

Cast

as Jenny Davis *

as Dave *

as Stoney *

as Steve Davis *

Max Julien Maxwell Julien Banks (July 12, 1933 – January 1, 2022), better known by his stage name Max Julien, was an American actor, sculptor, and clothes designer best known for his role as Goldie in the 1973 blaxploitation film ''The Mack''. Julien als ...

as Elwood *

Adam Roarke Adam Roarke (born Richard Jordan Gerler, August 8, 1937 – April 27, 1996) was an American actor and film director. Life and career Roarke was born in Brooklyn, New York, where he was a street gang member during his youth. His father was a v ...

as Ben *

Henry Jaglom Henry David Jaglom (born January 26, 1938) is an English-born American actor, film director and playwright. Life and career Jaglom was born to a Jewish family in London, England, the son of Marie (née Stadthagen) and Simon M. Jaglom, who wor ...

as Warren *

Linda Gaye Scott Linda Gaye Scott (born February 1, 1943 in Los Angeles, California) is an American actress. Music career In 1963, Linda Gaye Scott appeared on the cover of Jan and Dean's second album "Jan and Dean Take Linda Surfin'." Another photo from the s ...

as Lynn *I.J. Jefferson as Pandora *

Ken Scott Ken Scott (born 20 April 1947) is a British record producer and engineer known for being one of the five main engineers for the Beatles, as well as engineering Elton John, Pink Floyd, Procol Harum, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Duran Duran, the Jef ...

as Preacher *

Garry Marshall Garry Kent Marshall (November 13, 1934 – July 19, 2016) was an American filmmaker and actor. He started his career in the 1960s writing for ''The Lucy Show'' and ''The Dick Van Dyke Show'' before he developed Neil Simon's 1965 play ''The Odd Co ...

as Plainclothesman *

John Cardos John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second E ...

as Thug *

Gary Kent Gary Kent (born June 7, 1933) is an American film director, actor, and stuntperson notable for his appearances in various independent, grindhouse and exploitation films. A native of Washington, Kent studied at the University of Washington before ...

as Thug Leader *

The Seeds The Seeds were an American psychedelic garage rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1965, best known for their highest charting single "Pushin' Too Hard". The band's classic line-up featured frontman Sky Saxon, guitarist Jan Savage (b ...

as Themselves *

Strawberry Alarm Clock Strawberry Alarm Clock is a psychedelic rock band formed in 1967 with origins in Glendale, California, a city about ten miles north of downtown Los Angeles. They are best known for their 1967 hit single "Incense and Peppermints". Categorized as ...

as Themselves

Production

Dick Clark Richard Wagstaff Clark (November 30, 1929April 18, 2012) was an American radio and television personality, television producer and film actor, as well as a cultural icon who remains best known for hosting ''American Bandstand'' from 1956 to 198 ...

, who produced the film, wrote in his memoirs that he insisted that the film have an anti-drug message "... because I'd seen the kids in the hippie commune living in awful squalor." He wrote in 1976, "... if you saw it

he film He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...

today you'd say it was a reasonably accurate account of what was going on then." The film was originally titled ''The Love Children'', but was changed at the request of distributors who worried that audiences might think it was "a film about bastards." Producer Samuel Z. Arkoff came up with the new title of ''Psych-Out'' based on a recent successful

reissue In the music industry, a reissue (also re-release, repackage or re-edition) is the release of an album or Single (music), single which has been released at least once before, sometimes with alterations or additions. Reasons for reissue New aud ...

of '' Psycho''. The film's special effects were created by stunt coordinator

. The majority of the songs in the film and on the original soundtrack album were performed by the Storybook, a

San Fernando Valley The San Fernando Valley, known locally as the Valley, is an urbanized valley in Los Angeles County, California. Located to the north of the Los Angeles Basin, it contains a large portion of the City of Los Angeles, as well as unincorporated ar ...

garage band.Psych-Out Soundtrack Album
The version of "The Pretty Song from Psych-Out" that appears on the film's soundtrack album was recorded by the Storybook, but the version heard in the film was by

Release

Director Richard Rush's cut came in at 101 minutes and was edited to 82 minutes by the producers, a version that would be released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

by Fox Video in 2003.

HBO Video Home Box Office, Inc. (HBO) is an American multinational media and entertainment company operating as a unit of Warner Bros. Discovery. Founded by Charles Dolan and based out of WarnerMedia's former corporate headquarters at the 30 Hudson Yard ...

's VHS release used a 98-minute version. On February 17, 2015, a 101-minute

director's cut A director's cut is an edited version of a film (or video game, television episode, music video, or commercial) that is supposed to represent the director's own approved edit in contrast to the theatrical release. "Cut" explicitly refers to the ...

was released on DVD and

Blu-ray The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of sto ...

References

External links