Review of The Gospel According to Philip K. Dick

• October 28, 2007
• James Skemp
• dvd / movie, review

I'm a fan of PKD, but this documentary fails in a number of major areas, making it almost useless in its scope.

First of all, the animations that are used in place of slides are annoying beyond _, but I suppose if they trimmed those up they'd only have an hour of play time.

The music reminded me of Assault on Precinct 13, and while it wasn't too bad, it was utterly diabolical when it was close to drowning out the interviewed individuals while they spoke. Definitely some audio issues that needed to be taken care of before this film was rolled out.

The interviewed individuals mostly provided interesting perspectives, but, overall, much of this information can be found in any of the numerous books on PKD's life. Some of the interviews should have been trimmed altogether, since they seemed to offer no real value.

I really wanted to like this documentary, but I truly struggled to watch the entire thing; the possibility that Williams or Wilson would offer some insight was all that kept me going ... Otherwise, the substance of this flick is pretty slim pickings.

Normally I'd give a film that I'm glad I watched, but didn't overall care for, a three star rating, but the only reason I'm glad I watched this was because it showed me that I didn't need to watch this.

Ah well.

There's a number of books on PKD that could be read instead, to much greater benefit, including Paul Williams' "Only Apparently Real", and Emmanuel Carrere's "I Am Alive And You Are Dead: A Journey Into the Mind of Philip K. Dick". See also "The Shifting Realities of Philip K. Dick: Selected Literary and Philosophical Writings" for further insights.

(Watched on Netflix online.)

• philip k. dick