Acid Eaters, The (1968)

Middle-class office workers Genna (Judy Wood), Chickie (Pat Barrington) and Fran (Lila Cranston Lamont) leave work on Friday afternoon and become weekend bikers, accompanied to a lake in the Californian countryside by Smiley (Bob Wren), Ollie (Ernie F. Orsatti) and Artie (Buck Kartalian).

They go for a topless swim, dance, party and play strip poker.

There they meet a girl called “Girl” (Sharon Carr) who flirts with their men and fights with the girls.

She eventually falls through some quicksand and ends up in hell.

Finally, the group “freak out” on (and in) “the White Pyramid”, a 50-foot tower of LSD.

In fantasy segments, a guy has sex with his neighbour and Pat Barrington dances topless while a black guy plays the bongos.

Comic actor Buck Kartalian dominates things as Artie and also shows up with a pitchfork as the devil, who shows the others how to smoke pot and gives them huge cubes of LSD.

Filmed in “psychedelic colour”, The Acid Eaters isn’t great cinema by any definition, but it’s one of the most fascinatingly surreal cash-ins on the peace and love generation made by people with obviously zero connections to the scene. It makes Skidoo (1968) look like Easy Rider (1969).

It’s an impossibly surreal film that follows no normal laws of narrative cinema. The trips to hell are unforgettable, as is the final orgy freak-out.

This film screams for a wider cult reputation than it has received.

Ollie
Eric Wahl
Genna
Judy Wood
Artie / The Devil
Buck Kartalian
Chickie
Pat Barrington
Fran
Lila Cranston
Smiley
Bob Wren
Big Jack
John McCloud
Marsha
Dianne Curtis
John
Chico Vespa

Director
B. Ron Elliott (Byron Mabe)