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One of the great­est things about the departed-but-not-forgotten Psychotronic Video mag­a­zine was its reli­ably great inter­views.  Cult film per­son­al­i­ties at all lev­els of fame were cov­ered but the best and most edu­ca­tional inter­views often came from the least-known sources.  One of Your Humble Reviewer’s favorites was an inter­view with William Rotsler, who is a cult fig­ure with sci-fi freaks of a cer­tain age for his nov­els and reg­u­lar pres­ence at 1970’s-era sci-fi festivals.

However, that wasn’t the thing that made the Rotsler inter­view so fas­ci­nat­ing.  The real hook was his long-standing asso­ci­a­tion with another genre, the soft­core skin-flick.  Rotsler shot, directed and acted in sev­eral shorts and fea­tures as well as being the edi­tor for Adam Film World, a skin-mag renowned for its qual­ity pho­tog­ra­phy (often done by Rotsler him­self).  His most famous work as a direc­tor is Mantis In Lace, a movie about a homi­ci­dal strip­per that is big favorite with Psychotronic’s Michael Weldon, but any­thing he did is guar­an­teed to fea­ture gor­geous girls au naturel and skill­ful photography.

Psychedelic Fever (called Like It Is on the title card) is a par­tic­u­larly inter­est­ing exam­ple of Rotsler’s work because it can be called both an exploita­tion quickie AND a work of avant-garde cin­ema.  There are no char­ac­ters or nar­ra­tive to speak of.  Instead, the film prowls its way through the hip­pie sub­cul­ture circa 1968 as var­i­ous inter­views with kids from the scene form a stream-of-consciousness ver­bal coun­ter­point to what we see.

The footage itself was drawn from loops that Rotsler sold on a mail-order basis, most likely via the ads sec­tion of men’s mag­a­zines.  Thus, this is a rare exam­ple of a film­maker edit­ing together a fea­ture from his own ‘found footage.’  There is no sto­ry­line to speak of but the inter­views and footage inter­con­nect peri­od­i­cally to cre­ate a series of short sce­nar­ios: there is a com­mune sequence where naked rev­ellers scarf down slices of water­melon before watch­ing an all-nude-girls band jam out, prowls through a renais­sance fair and down Haight-Ashbury and hip­pies hang­ing out in their bohemian dwellings as they pon­der the ram­i­fi­ca­tions of drop­ping out of society.

A lot of it is obvi­ously staged (you can usu­ally tell because the hip­pie girls are actu­ally enjoy­able to look at naked, i.e. strip­pers) but the inter­con­nec­tive tis­sue is on-the-street verite-type stuff that’s worth its weight in gold for those who want to see what California was like dur­ing the hip­pie era.  Rotsler’s cam­er­a­work is fan­tas­tic from start to fin­ish: his hand­held pho­tog­ra­phy is fluid and often lyri­cal, mak­ing great use of nat­ural light to cre­ate the hazy atmos­phere of those drug-dazzled times.

Even bet­ter, there are scenes where the unseen nar­ra­tors dis­cuss their psy­che­delic expe­ri­ences that lead us into the avant-garde por­tions of the film.  Specifically, there are two amaz­ing, epic sequences where Rotsler uses every psychedelic-optical trick in the book to bring the narrator’s acid-trip expe­ri­ences to life on screen.  He uses dou­ble and triple expo­sures to cre­ate eye-scorching col­lages like naked go-go girls danc­ing over found footage while fire­works go off over them or a girl on a bad trip being bedev­iled by visions of skulls and strip­pers in chains.  These sequences fur­ther ben­e­fit from a wild psych-jazz score by that mixes jam­ming and exper­i­men­tal electronics.

The end result is mul­ti­pur­pose schlock: Psychedelic Fever suc­ceeds as a sexed-up faux-documentary on naked hip­pies, a glimpse into the atti­tudes and appear­ance of a lost time and a cap­ti­vat­ing dis­play of exper­i­men­tal film edit­ing and opti­cal tech­niques.  It’s a real find for any­one who enjoys exploita­tion fare of this era and well worth a look for any­one who enjoyed Mantis In Lace.  William Rotsler deserves greater promi­nence in exploita­tion film cir­cles and Psychedelic Fever makes a good case for his schlocky greatness.

(Note: this is one of four films in VCI’s Drive-In Grindhouse set — the other three are Summer School, Up Yours — A Rockin’ Comedy and The Farmer’s Other Daughter.  All four will be reviewed at Schlockmania)