Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Dirty Pictures

Collapse
X
Collapse
  •  
    Mark Tolch
    Senior Member

  • Dirty Pictures


    Released By: Breaking Glass Pictures
    Released On: 11/22/2011
    Director: Etienne Sauret
    Cast: Alexander Shulgin
    Purchase From Amazon

    The Film:

    In 1966, former Harvard student Dr. Alexander “Sasha” Shulgin quit his job at Dow Chemical to devote his time to studying psychoactive drugs. Working with some therapists from a lab in his home, Shulgin synthesized an existing compound known as MDMA, which was then tested on a number of patients in therapy. Studies showed that “ecstacy” had positive effects on patients with psychological issues, giving them a slight sense of euporia and well-being, and also helped to strengthen the doctor/patient bond. Not content to take other people's word on how fantastic this compound was, Sasha decided to carry out further experiments on himself, using MDMA and a range of other psychoactive (and illegal) drugs.

    Etienne Sauret's film Dirty Pictures attempts to tell the story of Shulgin's life, mostly through interviews with the man himself. Also along for the ride are Shulgin's wife, who is interviewed extensively, relatives, other scientists, and a DEA agent who has known the good doctor for years. Breaking up the monotony of the numerous talking heads are clips from television specials and news reports on Shulgin and the threat of the new illegal drug known as ecstacy, as well as footage from Psychedelic “summits”, acid festivals, and raves. But for some reason, the film doesn't really ever get off the ground. With so many interviews, the viewer should expect some serious insight into Shulgin's life, but instead, we end up with a bunch of information that could've been gleaned from glossing over a Wikipedia article.


    Some of the film comes off as more interesting than other parts, namely Shulgin's primitive lab set back in the woods on his property; and a scene in which the police show up and startled to learn that Shulgin has peyote growing freely at their feet. And seeing the number of people impressed with his contribution to the world of drug experimentation is interesting, but counters what seems to be one of the points of the film…if he's a scientist and MDMA is an important development in therapeutic research, how come the majority of people praising him are the ones taking the drug recreationally to make their glowsticks look cooler? By the time we get to the medical sceptic who rips apart Shulgin's self experimentation and then talks about having his head frozen so that he can be cloned in 200 years to have sex with a bunch of strange women after his wife is dead, well….it can safely be said that the picture lacks focus.

    The copy on the back cover of Dirty Pictures says that it “examines Dr. Shulgin's lifelong quest to unlock the mysteries of the mind”, but by the end of the film, all you get is the idea that Shulgin is a somewhat well-meaning chemist who quit his job to make drugs and get stoned. Not exactly the in-depth look that I was hoping for.



    Video/Audio/Extras:

    Breaking Glass brings Dirty Pictures to DVD in a transfer that is somewhat disappointing. Though it's not horrific, the 1.78:1 anamorphic video consists of some pretty nasty compression artifacts, and heavy interlacing in a lot of scenes. Because of the inclusion of many different sources, the picture quality is pretty varied. The Dolby Digital 2.0 track is adequate for the film, with volume being fairly consistent across the board. Dialogue-intensive, it doesn't require a lot of dynamic range, and does the trick without being impressive.

    There are a couple of extras included as well; a photo gallery using stills from the film can be found with accompanying music, and a trailer for Dirty Pictures as well as 3 other trailers for Breaking Glass titles rounds the supplements off.

    The Final Word:

    As a mildly interesting fluff piece that would appear on Discovery Channel, Dirty Pictures is not bad. As a feature-length documentary, one gets the feeling that a lot more work could've been put into it.


      Posting comments is disabled.

    Latest Articles

    Collapse

    • Hot Spur (Severin Films) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Severin Films
      Released on: April 30th, 2024.
      Director: Lee Frost
      Cast: Joseph Mascolo, Virginia Goodman, John Alderman
      Year: 1969
      Purchase From Amazon

      Hot Spur – Movie Review:

      Director Lee Frost and Producer Bob Cresse's film, Hot Spur, opens in Texas in 1869 with a scene where a pair of cowboys wanders into a bar where they call over a pretty Mexican waitress and coerce her into dancing for them. She obliges, but
      ...
      03-22-2024, 11:53 AM
    • Death Squad (Mondo Macabro) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Mondo Macabro
      Released on: April 9th, 2024.
      Director: Max Pecas
      Cast: Thierry de Carbonnières, Jean-Marc Maurel, Denis Karvil, Lillemour Jonsson
      Year: 1985
      Purchase From Amazon

      Death Squad – Movie Review:

      Also known as Brigade Of Death, French sleaze auteur Max Pecas’ 1985 film, Death Squad, opens with a night time scene outside of Paris in the Bois de Boulogne Forest where cars pass by a small gang of transsexual
      ...
      03-22-2024, 11:46 AM
    • Roommates (Quality X) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Quality X
      Released on: February 28th, 2024.
      Director: Chuck Vincent
      Cast: Samantha Fox, Vernoica Hart, Kelly Nichols, Jerry Butler, Jamie Gillis
      Year: 1982
      Purchase From Amazon

      Roommates – Movie Review:

      Directed by Chuck Vincent and released in 1982, Roommates opens with a scene where a young woman named Joan Harmon (Veronica Hart) gets a hotel room with an older man named Ken (Don Peterson, credited as Phil Smith),
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:10 PM
    • Night Of The Blood Monster (Blue Underground) UHD/Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Blue Underground
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Jess Franco
      Cast: Christopher Lee, Maria Rohm, Dennis Price
      Year: 1970
      Purchase From Amazon

      Night Of The Blood Monster – Movie Review:

      Directed by Jess Franco, The Bloody Judge (or, Night Of The Blood Monster, as it is going by on this new release from Blue Underground) isn't quite the salacious exercise in Eurotrash you might expect it to be, and while it
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:07 PM
    • Phase IV (Vinegar Syndrome) UHD/Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Vinegar Syndrome
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Saul Bass
      Cast: Nigel Davenport, Michael Murphy, Lynne Frederick, Alan Gifford, Robert Henderson, Helen Horton
      Year: 1974
      Purchase From Amazon

      Phase IV – Movie Review:

      Saul Bass’ 1974 sci-fi/thriller Phase IV is an interesting blend of nature run amuck stereotypes and Natural Geographic style nature footage mixed into one delicious cocktail of suspense and
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:02 PM
    • The Bounty Hunter Trilogy (Radiance Films) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Radiance Films
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Shigehiro Ozawa, Eiichi Kudo
      Cast: Tomisaburo Wakayama, Minoru Ôki, Arashi Kanjuro, Bin Amatsu, Chiezo Kataoka
      Year: 1969-1972
      Purchase From Amazon

      The Bounty Hunter Trilogy – Movie Review:

      Radiance Films gathers together the three films in Toie Studios’ Bounty Hunter Trilogy, starring the inimitable Tomisaburo Wakayama. Here’s how the three movies in this
      ...
      03-13-2024, 11:30 AM
    Working...
    X