Cannabis culture

April 3, 2011 5:00 AM

Cannabis Culture
posted by twoleftfeet (59 comments total)

These happy people are making me jealous. :(
posted by midnightbarber at 5:08 AM on April 3, 2011

I can't confirm this at the moment, but I'm pretty sure this from an obscure 1971 film called Taking Off.
posted by twoleftfeet at 5:29 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

I would really like to know where this come from.

Greats tags!
posted by CitoyenK at 5:29 AM on April 3, 2011

Definitely, "Taking Off". Great scene here.
posted by twoleftfeet at 5:32 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

"Stay off drugs, kids. And stay in school."
posted by Obscure Reference at 5:40 AM on April 3, 2011

Usually I don't get real excited by most mashups..but this, this was fantastic...

also...pb will be sending you a bill for the cost of expanding the capacity of the server that holds the tags database.
posted by tomswift at 5:45 AM on April 3, 2011 [5 favorites]

I've got to stop making posts when I'm stoned. I swear I saw Bentley from "The Jeffersons"!

The entire film "Taking Off" is actually online.

Bentley?
posted by twoleftfeet at 6:03 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

The anachronistic thing about this isn't that they're smoking pot, it's seeing this many wealthy Americans smoking anything at all...
posted by PeterMcDermott at 6:15 AM on April 3, 2011

Dope, if it's good enough for Buck Henry, it's good enough for me.
posted by doctor_negative at 6:43 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Also from the same film, a very young Carly Simon tells me that long term physical effects are not yet known, so I'm going to have another drag, and just get stoned.
posted by twoleftfeet at 6:44 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

I feel you need a few more tags for this post, the taxonomy is frustratingly incomplete.

Nice to see joints getting passed left and right. Stamp out bong use!
posted by porn in the woods at 7:01 AM on April 3, 2011

Taking off is fantastic! It has a really, really young Kathy Bates (billed as Bobo Bates) and she's playing guitar and singing a song she wrote. It has a square older couple visiting an Ike and Tina Turner show! And it has this scene which is pretty damn funny!

I got to see this when MoMA was doing a retrospective of Milos Forman films, and he talked about how in a weird way this was supposed to be a follow up to "Hair." It started out with a concept of a girl running away from upstate to New York City to audition to be in Hair, and it mophed into a story mostly about her parents. It has a few brilliant moments of very typical Forman subtle physical comedy, and is really fun to watch. I'm now bummed it doesn't appear to be on Netflix.
posted by piratebowling at 7:02 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Eh, fits. the most ...enthusiastic tokens I know are all classical music nerds, usually older. I know way more retired smokers then younger ones. Younger people are into the pills.
posted by The Whelk at 7:06 AM on April 3, 2011

Taking Off is indeed fantastic. It's a truly forgotten gem. For me, this is a rare situation where I only started learning the backstory of my post after I made the post. "Who can fuck the lilies" (which appears just after 20 minutes into the film) is absolutely beautiful.

If I'd known about the movie before I made the post, the movie would have been the post.
posted by twoleftfeet at 7:12 AM on April 3, 2011

On that note I have nothing to do today soooooo.....

* bubbling noises*
posted by The Whelk at 7:12 AM on April 3, 2011 [6 favorites]

Your tag list, it burns!

Well played!
posted by fourcheesemac at 7:33 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Your tag list, it burns!

I see what you did there.
posted by neckro23 at 7:36 AM on April 3, 2011

oh oh oh! I was backstage at the most recent revival of HAIR and they all the standard prop boxes, wigs, shoes, vests, etc, and two drawers labelled

JOINTS (prop), JOINTS (Regular)
posted by The Whelk at 7:39 AM on April 3, 2011 [10 favorites]

That guy with the tuxedo and the slicked-back hair is totally bogarting.
posted by Flashman at 7:48 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Also when I think "cannabis culture" i think more this
posted by The Whelk at 8:09 AM on April 3, 2011 [5 favorites]

I've got to stop making posts when I'm stoned. I swear I saw Bentley from "The Jeffersons"!

I am pretty sure that is him, Paul Benedict who also played the Number Painter on Sesame Street.

Hmmm, come to think of it, these were filmed around the same time and the Number Painter is painting numbers on sandwiches . . . .
posted by jeremias at 8:11 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

I liked this better before I knew it was from a movie. I had this idea in my head this was some award dinner party, maybe in 1966, a Rotarians thing. But a very hip Rotarians thing led by the funny old bachelor guy who everyone loved but was a bit suspicious of. And somehow he talked everyone into trying the funny new thing, and they had no idea what they were getting into, and everyone had a great time. Plus they had widdly scuds for dinner.
posted by Nelson at 8:14 AM on April 3, 2011 [5 favorites]

I am pretty sure that is him, Paul Benedict

It's definitely him. His IMDB entry mentions it as one of his first roles. Also, Ted Baxter's ditsy girlfriend/wife Georgette is in this film (Georgia Engel) in her first movie appearance.
posted by twoleftfeet at 8:23 AM on April 3, 2011

Vincent Schiavelli and Paul Benedict were instantly recognisable. Cool beans.
posted by Dodecadermaldenticles at 8:40 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Brilliant.
posted by dazed_one at 8:48 AM on April 3, 2011

I got to see this when MoMA was doing a retrospective of Milos Forman films, and he talked about how in a weird way this was supposed to be a follow up to "Hair." It started out with a concept of a girl running away from upstate to New York City to audition to be in Hair, and it mophed into a story mostly about her parents.

So.... Hair the musical, off-Broadway in 1967... Taking Off the movie released in 1971... Hair the movie released in 1979.... And so the movie of the sequel was made 8 years before the filming of the musical..... So it's a sequel to the stage show? Or it's a sequel to a film he hadn't even been contracted to make yet?

I think if you're going to be revisionist with your history, you at least need to make sure all the events happen in the right order.
posted by hippybear at 9:44 AM on April 3, 2011

I think if you're going to be revisionist with your history, you at least need to make sure all the events happen in the right order.

I fashion my future
On films in space
posted by twoleftfeet at 9:56 AM on April 3, 2011

This clip seems to be one of those things (like Robert Altman's almost unwatchable M*A*S*H*) that hasnt really much going for it besides a certain strain of dated irreverence. A kind of "fuck you, mannnn" that must have seemed vital and revolutionary in its day that now just seems antiquated and sorta quaint.

While I am grateful for the boundary smashing of previous generations, I think the lesson learned is that while irreverence is greatand all there should be something else there too if you want it to play well 20, 30, 40 years down the road.

Otherwise in this case you just end up with cheap juxtaposition ala one of the Movie* Movies.

Still, I love Buck Henry so Ill track it down and give the film a fair shake. This here is pretty meh.

* - Scary, Epic, Etc
posted by Senor Cardgage at 10:08 AM on April 3, 2011

It's interesting that the Ave Maria used is not the Catholic prayer. Rather, it's the original Schubert Ellens dritter Gesang. I don't think that most people realize the version we're most familiar with is a later adaptation of the prayer to the original music.
posted by sbutler at 10:36 AM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

hippybear, I think the point was that originally the script had her running off to join the cast of Hair in New York, a perfectly apt cultural reference in 1971 (when the musical had been on Broadway three years running), but in the end (according to reviews, I haven't watched it yet), they left her reasons for "taking off" unspecified, making it more of a conundrum about the generation gap than a glib cliché more at home in later TV movies about the 60s (or, for that matter, The '60s). It was only later that he came to direct the film of the musical.
posted by dhartung at 10:45 AM on April 3, 2011

Okay, that makes sense.

I did just watch the film. It's not bad all around. One of those quiet satires and very "indie" in spirit.
posted by hippybear at 10:50 AM on April 3, 2011

A kind of "fuck you, mannnn" that must have seemed vital and revolutionary in its day that now just seems antiquated and sorta quaint.

And yet, pot is still illegal...
posted by nzero at 10:57 AM on April 3, 2011 [5 favorites]

Wow. I think this post is more about the tag list than the SLVimeo.

the most ...enthusiastic tokens I know are all classical music nerds, usually older.

So very true. I have a fiftysomething co-worker who regularly enthuses about going into orbit while listening to x or y classical masterpiece.

If nothing else, this clip shows its age in one key way: civlized people now vaporize.
posted by mykescipark at 11:00 AM on April 3, 2011 [2 favorites]

I think we should do this again next week.

Kinda like flash on Fridays we'll call it SOSFilter: Stoned On Sunday Filter. Bring something we can enjoy between hits.
posted by Bathtub Bobsled at 11:01 AM on April 3, 2011 [3 favorites]

I find it interesting that the only VIMEO sidelink available from this clip is an edit of various weird and random NSFW stuff to Mudhoney's Touch Me I'm Sick. Must be marijuana psychosis.
posted by philip-random at 11:11 AM on April 3, 2011

Missing the left-handed tobacco tag.
posted by sneebler at 11:12 AM on April 3, 2011

Also the 4:22 and chachacha tags.

Is that what chachacha is? Someone was asking us in the bar one night, but my terminology module is obsolete. The old completist module is functioning just fine.
posted by sneebler at 11:16 AM on April 3, 2011

Also lids, keys. Sorry I missed 4:20 the first time round.
posted by sneebler at 11:18 AM on April 3, 2011

If nothing else, this clip shows its age in one key way: civlized people now vaporize.

You take that back!

...er, I mean, maybe I ain't civilized, but I sure do enjoy me the occasional jazz cigarette.

If you'll all excuse me I have to make a phone call.
posted by brennen at 11:19 AM on April 3, 2011

dhartung had it right, she was running away to join a stage production of "hair". Sorry if my story was confusing, hippybear. I'm just relating what the director said about the film.
posted by piratebowling at 11:26 AM on April 3, 2011

Ora pro nobis peccatoribus...
posted by clavdivs at 11:37 AM on April 3, 2011

Ike Turner - Himself
Tina Turner - Herself

Buck Henry is genius.
posted by clavdivs at 11:40 AM on April 3, 2011

Vaporizers come on too strong and have no sensual experience to them, you might as well taker a pill.

I'm sorry I'm just going out for some air.
posted by The Whelk at 12:30 PM on April 3, 2011 [2 favorites]

I'm back who wants to play Civilization?
posted by The Whelk at 12:50 PM on April 3, 2011 [2 favorites]

'' Sorry this video does not exist. ''

We all hallucinated
posted by CitoyenK at 1:24 PM on April 3, 2011

Sorry, "Cannabis Culture" was deleted at 4:20:01 Sun Apr 3, 2011. We have no more information about it on our mainframe or elsewhere.

Well played, but I actually wanted to watch this...
posted by brightghost at 2:07 PM on April 3, 2011

there you go
posted by CitoyenK at 2:10 PM on April 3, 2011

Thanks!
posted by brightghost at 2:26 PM on April 3, 2011

What the ever-loving fuck are you doing with the tags?
posted by odinsdream at 2:50 PM on April 3, 2011

Vaporizers come on too strong and have no sensual experience to them

I'm not gonna say you're doing it wrong, but...
posted by mykescipark at 3:00 PM on April 3, 2011

Deleted at 4:20?

I've asked the mods to replace the Vimeo link with the YouTube link. Thanks, CitoyenK!
posted by twoleftfeet at 3:55 PM on April 3, 2011

Replaced the link, carry on.
posted by jessamyn at 3:56 PM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

Thank you for passing the joint, jessamyn!
posted by twoleftfeet at 4:02 PM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

"EAR!"
posted by clavdivs at 5:57 PM on April 3, 2011

Senor Cardgage: "This clip seems to be one of those things (like Robert Altman's almost unwatchable M*A*S*H*) that hasnt really much going for it besides a certain strain of dated irreverence. A kind of "fuck you, mannnn" that must have seemed vital and revolutionary in its day that now just seems antiquated and sorta quaint.

While I am grateful for the boundary smashing of previous generations, I think the lesson learned is that while irreverence is greatand all there should be something else there too if you want it to play well 20, 30, 40 years down the road.

Otherwise in this case you just end up with cheap juxtaposition ala one of the Movie* Movies.

Still, I love Buck Henry so Ill track it down and give the film a fair shake. This here is pretty meh.

* - Scary, Epic, Etc"

...
buuuuzzkill
posted by Rickalicioso at 6:17 PM on April 3, 2011 [1 favorite]

where can i get some god damned widdly scuds
posted by tehloki at 9:00 PM on April 3, 2011

The music and the quality and style of the images, they combine to create the effect that I am watching vintage, high-class pornography, a stag film for formal herb devotees.

It's a nice change from the eternal presence of alcohol.
posted by Appropriate Username at 10:05 PM on April 3, 2011

Just for the record, MASH is, in fact, extremely watchable.
posted by the bricabrac man at 3:58 AM on April 4, 2011

The movie, not the TV show.
posted by Rash at 8:42 AM on April 4, 2011