Dante Looks Back To The Sixties With Kaleidoscope Eyes

For the longest time, Roger Corman's The Trip was without a certificate from the BBFC, effectively banning it from cinema and video in the UK. It was refused four times, the last in 1988, before it was finally permitted an 18 certificate on November 21st 2002. I'd already picked up an R1 DVD by then, but I'm glad that should I now ever want to book it into a British cinema, I won't need to appeal for special dispensation from the local council.

The rationale behind the 'banning' was that the film was "instructive" in the arena of drug use - wheras, say, Easy Rider is not or The Matrix is not or Go is not or... I could go on... for hours. To make sure his 'instructions' were at least adjacent to reality, director Roger Corman reportedly experimented with hallucinogens during the writing and production of the film. It's this acid-streaked shoot that will provide the basis for Joe Dante's upcoming The Man With Kaleidoscope Eyes.

The real Corman is to cameo in the film, alongside Martin Scorsese, John Sayles and Jonathan Demme. No idea who will be playing the young Corman role, the moviemaking protagonist, as yet but it's tempting to imagine he'll be introduced to the real man in a scene not unlike Johnny Depp and Hunter Thompson's moment together in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. As for Scorsese, it strikes me as essential that he is cast as the slacks wearing, cufflink adorned uptight Itallianamerican cameraman of the Woodstock era.

Dante's out at Berlin at the moment, russling up cash, interest and partners for the $7 million film. Shooting is scheduled for later in the year and hopefully we'll see this living up to it's immense promise sometime in 2008.