"Many of the boxes come with halos."

"I finally learned how to come into possession of an encyclopedia. I already own one now - the whole thing contained in three glass vials. Bought them in a science psychedeli. Books are no longer read but eaten, not made of paper but of some informational substance, fully digestible, sugar-coated. I also did a little browsing in a psychem supermarket. Arranged on the shelves are beautifully packaged low-calorie opinionates, gullibloons - credibility beans? - abstract extract in antique gallon jugs, and iffies, argumunchies, puritands and dysectasy. A pity I didn't have an interpreter. Psychedeli must be from psychedelicatessen. And the theoapotheteria on Sixth Avenue has to be a theological apothecary cafeteria, judging from the items on display. Aisles and aisles of absolventina, theopathine, genuflix, orisol. An enormous place; organ music in the background while you shop. All the faiths are represented too - there's christendine, antichristendine, ormuzal, arymanol, anabaptiban, methadone, brahmax, supralapsarian, suppositories, and zoroaspics, quaker oats, yogart, mishnameal and apocryphal dip. Pills, tablets, syrups, elixirs, powders, gums - they even have lollipops for the children."

-Stanislaw Lem
The Futurological Congress

Are you hallucinating?

"There were fewer rats now, they must have walked off somewhere. Only four remained. At the feet of Professor Trottelreiner, who was sound asleep, they were playing bridge, using his cards. Bridge? Even with the unusually high concentration of hallucinogens in the air, was it possible for rats to play bridge? Worried, I looked over the fattest one's shoulder. He was holding his cards helter-skelter, and didn't even follow suit. It was alright then...I gave a sigh of relief."

-Stanislaw Lem
The Futurological Congress

Urgent Message! The World's Greatest Sinner returns to TCM!

Many moons ago, I reviewed The World's Greatest Sinner after catching it on late night TCM. To briefly recap, the movie follows a man named Hilliard who quits his job, forms a new political party, embraces rock'n'roll, declares himself a god, seduces the young and old alike, and engages in increasingly bizarre activities. And in reality, the movie is so much stranger than it already sounds. It's an amazingly bizarre no-budget movie from 1962, with all music done by a pre-Mothers of Invention Frank Zappa. For anyone with a tolerance for cinematic weirdness, I can't recommend it enough.

The downside to recommending this movie, though, is that it's not available on DVD. Which isn't necessarily all that suprising, given how strange it is, how low budget it is, and how incomprehensible the filmmaking can be at times. But all those things help to contribute to its downright, shit-your-pants amazingness.

But good news! TCM will be playing it again next Friday night, April 17th, at 2am (EST). See the TCM Underground website for more information. So mark your calendar's, find a friend who has cable, maybe get some booze, and hunker down for a fantasia of cult movie fantasticness. Miss it again, and who knows when you'll get another chance. (Probably never! Do you hear that? Never!)