Know Your Mushrooms

I had been hoping this would be more than a primer - it didn't rise above the entry level, but that is OK because I think it was intended for newbies, not aficionados.

All the same, kind of fun and innocuous, unless seeing folks ingesting psylocybin is a turn-off. The factoid shroom was amusing, even if it did resemble low-key PBS early morning children's viewing stylings.

I would highly recommend a follow-up attempt as mycophobia in America is endemic. Go for more identification of edible species, highlight more of the "eat these and die a terribly horrible death" shrooms, include a section exclusively for the psychoactive shroom examples (c'mon, they mentioned amanita muscaria without sharing about the various types of amanitas in the wild nor did they clearly state - PROCEED WITH CAUTION WHEN EATING THIS VARIETY).

A good attempt that generally informs and entertains and they surely left plenty of room for others to do it even better - where are you Discovery Channel?

I saw this documentary yesterday on the BAFICI (Buenos Aires International Independent Film Festival) with the presence of Mann.

He told us that Jim Jarmusch (who is keen on mushrooms) suggested him to do this movie, which he did with a very reduced budget. My opinion is that he was not very interested on making the movie, he become interested while he was doing it, thats why I think he does not have a clear point of view about the subject, he is just a witness.

It contains testimonies from mushroom experts, scenes from the mushroom festival in Colorado, extracts from old educational films and old cartoons which make references to mushrooms (just like on his previous work "Grass"). He covers different mushroom purposes (for cooking, for tripping, for medicine, for environmental benefits) without dragging very deep into each one, it just give you a general and superficial outlook.

With all the grace and finesse of some dude on shrooms, KYM takes a look at mushrooms and tries to make its topic fun. For the most part, it works. It teaches some interesting facts about mushrooms and is entertaining. But there is little else here. With no narration, there is no real plot or connecting thread between topics (other than everything is about mushrooms). And while a great deal seems to be aimed at kids, much of the focus is about the psychedelic properties of some mushrooms (making it easy to suppose this is not targeting kids). And if it is not targeting kids, one has to wonder what the purpose of formatting facts as "Did You Know" questionnaires is (of which the answer is glaringly obvious). In the end, what you have is a lighthearted documentary that isn't too bad (but it didn't convince me to like the fungi).

Not such a bad film per se. But viewing as a nature lover especially fond of fungi, its down side stuck out in various ways. The problem can be summed up thus: this film looks at fungi solely through the lens of a fairly overt "mushroom hippie" sensibility. Especially as celebrated at this particular "alternative" mushroom festival event in Colorado each year (apparently).

I understand (and I'm glad) fungi have their countercultural appeal. It just seemed they were portrayed like a cult fetish and cause for party. I'm totally interested in mushrooms, and have no moral issues about the ones of such great interest in this film (you might catch my drift), or people's personal curiosity about that. But everything has its limit.

In this vein, the film didn't seem to know whether it was mainly about mushrooms, or about the people and groovy festival event. And whether it wanted to be a documentary, or a "message" or propaganda (not as nice a word) film like we see these days (Expelled, What the Bleep, etc etc) -- the cult fetish metaphor again.

"Know Your Mushrooms" (even the title ...) has a 2-word "take home" message display at the end of its final credit, and on the CD box too I see: "End mycophobia." There's a good focus for what I found wrong in this movie.

It sounds like they don't like mycophobia, but what's the beef? One might as well protest fairy tales, the Brothers Grimm. Indeed, mycophobia a time-honored folkloric pattern in English tradition, and not very widespread in other cultures. As such it's worthy of recognition and cultural conservation, I think. But in this film it comes under direct attack as if it were a villain or something bad. True, it is quaint and provincial but, c'mon.

What the film doesn't admit: there are many in USA who haven't been accidentally poisoned, as a result of - having left wild mushrooms well enough alone, instead of tempting fate, fooling around with them. If you don't believe that, check into frequency of mushroom poisoning reports from countries in which gathering mushrooms for the meal is common practice. Some mushrooms can be devilishly difficult to identify. And you can get first-hand stories of mushroom poisoning at any amateur mushroom enthusiast club meeting.

So I don't know about what this film's visionaries are thinking. Where's their appreciation for our entire beloved literary tradition of mushrooms as icons of mystery and fear, symbols of decay and decomposition and everything rotten? "Fungi from Yuggoth" by HP Lovecraft, great stuff steeped in mycophobia and superbly so.

So, I was a little disconcerted by this movie's attempt to convince everyone how great fungi are, and get all excited about them. On impression, their secrets may deserve to be defended, just as their habitats need to be conserved. I'd rather this film help preserve our cultural, artistic and literary legacy -- including mycophobia!

But alas, rebellion against tradition for its own sake (maybe?) can be fun, I guess. At least this film likes mushrooms, that I can relate to. Ordinarily.

Let's start with the cinematography. I think this might have been shot on a couple of cellphone cameras by camera operators who had drunk a few gallons of coffee. The shakiness of the image is nausea-inducing, even on a small screen. I pity anyone who had to see this in a movie theater.

The historic stock footage of mushrooms and how they are portrayed in pop culture is the most interesting part of the film, but only makes up a tiny percentage of the movie.

A great deal of screen time is spent on loud music and pointless cheesy computer animations.

The mushroom hunters who converge on the Telluride Mushroom festival are portrayed as insane drugged out hippies, rather than the knowledgeable scientists many of them are.

The editing is random and pointless (kind of like this scattered review that I am writing) and has no narrative thrust. It's just a bunch of random crap strung together, with "Fun With Fungi" factoids popping up every couple of minutes like out of some bad PBS children's TV show, interspersed with shaky footage from the mushroom festival and the previously mentioned stock footage.

As a mushroom fanatic, I really wanted to like this documentary, since there are so few programs out there about fungi. I wish I could recommend this program, but I can't.