Délire

Yep, this is it.. a new candidate for my worst film of all time. A dopey hippy touches a skeleton of an old Native American while out in the desert with his buddy, and he starts getting disturbing visions. Nothing however, could be as disturbing as this self-indulgent crap, which is wall to wall with bad folk music, painful dialogue and acting so bad it has to been seen to believed. The plot is completely incoherent: Just what is the point of all those endless flashbacks featuring angels? They mean NOTHING.

Never has there been a more annoying on screen presence than the character portrayed by Carl Crow, who is just like Bob Dylan.. except for the intelligence and talent. His mumbling platitudes about life and love will have you climbing the wall in seconds, and we have him to 'thank' for the dreadful opening song. Oh joy.

To be honest, after the first 30 minutes I couldn't stomach anymore of the pain. Off the TV went, and I hurried into the garden to do a spot of weeding. Ignore anybody who says they enjoyed it, because they are lying. This is a movie destined to float through history, unloved and unwanted by everybody. It's only possible function is as an extreme form of torture for enemies of the state. Even then, it might be a bit much.. 0/10

I last saw this movie about ten years ago, so my review will probably come off as a bit sketchy. Briefly, "Premonition" centers around a group of hippie musicians who discover some unusual red flowers, smoke them, and experience terrifying hallucinations. Or ARE they just hallucinations? As a horror film, "Premonition" is very understated--almost too much so. (Much of the script is preoccupied with character development but the characters are dull, so you never really feel involved with them.) But what it lacks in excitement, it more than makes up for in terms of atmosphere and mood. The "hallucination" scenes are quite disturbing and, as the members of the hippie troupe start to become obsessed with what they see under the influence of the red flowers (and with what it all could mean), the viewer is overtaken by a flesh-crawling sensation of slow, certain doom. This is precisely what I look for, but find so rarely, in a horror movie. "Premonition" was never easy to find, and will be even less so in the post-VHS age. But if you ever run across a copy, snatch it up. The soundtrack is terrific (even the corny, ersatz-folk theme song is used to chilling effect) and perfectly complements the general theme of the film...i.e., the nature of reality and what lies beyond the limits of our normal, everyday perception. Congratulations to Alan Rudolph for putting together a creepy, effective, one-of-a-kind genre picture!

I found a VHS copy of this film for the equivalent of 50c when I was a kid at a junk sale with the title "Tales of Terror - The Impure - Wild Rider" and it became a mystery to be unravelled for this particular small town boy from England. It seemed so strange and other-worldy. The film itself is a hippie-fied self indulgent psychedelic mess but is entertaining all the same, especialy the freak out festival scene. This got played in the background at more than a few parties of my youth. I always wondered who would make and appear in such a film and now thanks to imdb I know. It was sad to hear Carl Crow drowned in 1978.But I'm interested to find out more about what the rest of the cast went on to. Be warned the electronic music which starts up when the deadly flower comes into view and that accompanies a lot of the dream sequences is very annoying to 21st century ears. That said your chances of finding a copy of this film and seeing it or of reading this review are pretty slim.

Was slow---the horror part was dead--however there were positive aspects: i liked the settings, the houses, the green hillside where the concert took place, the characters (they had a cool way of behaving and talking and conveyed intelligence). The characters were truly "mellow." Also the music was high quality.

A music band shacks up in a cabin to practice for an audition at a hippie gathering of some sort -- all the while smoking weed from a mysterious red flower that gives them hallucinations and nightmares. The acting was both bad and good; at points it was natural, at points terrible. The film was well shot, the locations real dirty and gritty and there we're some beautiful shots of landscapes and women, along with some wonderfully freaky imagery. Other highlights include the music; you have folksy guitar rhythms, charming b-movie pulsating synths, and a wonderful dancing hippie sequence towards the end. If you're into rare b movies, and can tolerate bad editing, incomprehensible story lines, and characters narrating the story directly into the camera, it's worth seeking out for the hippies alone.