Psychomagic: A Healing Art

Alejandro Jodorowsky is a cult filmmaker whose 95th birthday is this week. There's a very good chance that Psychomagic, his first documentary and most recent film as of writing (released the year he turned 90), will end up being his final film. I may be wrong, but I can't think of many directors at all who've made something after turning 90 (Clint Eastwood and Yoji Yamada are the only two I can think of).

It's a fittingly strange film to go out on, if it's his last, and the fact it shows brief clips from some of his older films gives it a feeling of finality. But I'd also say Jodorowsky's sole documentary could well be a contender for his worst film, and quality-wise, it'll be sad if this is his last contribution to cinema.

Alejandro Jodorowsky claims to have developed a unique method of healing he calls Psychomagic, done mostly as an alternative to trauma-focused therapy. His bizarre commitment to his craft and the complexities/potential problems with it could make for a fascinating film... if directed by someone who wasn't Jodorowsky. The fact he gets to tell the story of the crazy, out-there, disturbing, and sometimes very uncomfortable form of therapy that he "invented" sort of rubbed me the wrong way.

At the same time, you expect this kind of ridiculousness from Jodorowsky. It does feel uniquely like a film of his, and it is sort of in character for the kind of filmmaker he is. That keeps me from rating this lower, because I think he sort of succeeded in making the kind of film he wanted to make. But, at the same time, I hate the approach, didn't find it very engaging, and would've been far more interested with a more balanced exploration of Jodorowsky and his psychological/spiritual beliefs, preferably coming from an outsider who very much wasn't the man himself.