Like It Is (1968)
This documentary on the "youth movement" of the late 1960s focuses on the hippie pot smoking/free love culture in the San Francisco Bay area.
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I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.
How sad is this?
Good concept, poorly executed.
The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.
Sci-fi great Bill Rotsler is also famous for his porn films, and this documentary wisely emphasizes nudity in its survey of the Haight-Ashbury scene.It's an MOS exercise, with heavy narration track, mainly hippie-dippy types explaining themselves in terms only the late Dennis Hopper could really appreciate, man. One know-it-all young voice-over guy was particularly annoying to me with his snake-oil patter. I wouldn't be surprised if his everything-is-everything approach has been replaced in his middle age by a Tony Robbins-style inspirational spiel -that goes with our bedraggled times.Rotsler delights in showing us communal living here, with more full-frontal nudity by both sexes than I can remember in many films of this ilk. The DVD box claims this is R-rated but it is most definitely soft-X.There is some actual docu footage of real hippies at play in parks, but generally Rotsler fakes it for the fans, showing us many of the popular ultra-busty strippers and nude models of the day. Notable is Michelle Angelo, easily recognizable from the neck down in early scenes by virtue of her out-sized dark nipples, and later shown full-body-and-face dancing around with other very lovely girls. One blonde dancer (with a brown bush visible) gets the most attention.Acid trips are depicted with rather uninteresting visual effects, and some bondage, girls in chains, and skull imagery -all cornball. The required (by genre) body painting segment is unimaginative.End credits are all drawn on actual objects on the street, with a surprising closeup of humorist Stan Freberg's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, rather than that of a famous actor or actress. I liked that off-the-wall touch.