Blue Heron
$11.50
Dir. Michael Almereyda and Courtney Stephens
2025, USA, 89 min
Rated 18A (Unrated)
John Cunningham Lilly M.D. (1915-2001) sustained an extraordinary career through uniquely adventurous scientific research. His experimental projects were staged against the shifting backdrops of 1950s Cold War military science, the drug-infused counterculture of the 60s, and the environmental vanguard of the 70s. John Lilly and the Earth Coincidence Control Office, narrated by Chloë Sevigny, tells the story of Lilly’s quest, as one historian put it, to “get his hands on the steering wheel of consciousness” — a project that relied increasingly on psychedelics, leaving conventional science behind. Lilly invented the isolation tank and was a primary explorer in the study of dolphin communication, founding his own lab in Miami and St. Thomas, pairing a young female researcher with a young male dolphin in a partially-flooded house. In addition to this experiment’s circulation in pop culture, Lilly served as the inspiration for two Hollywood movies, The Day of the Dolphin and Altered States. The film reflects the scope of Lilly’s interests, the evolution of his public persona, and his interactions with equally exceptional contemporaries, including filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky.
