The daring experimenter Dr. John C. Lilly dedicated his life to radical self-investigation and unlocking the mysteries of consciousness and communication. “My body is my laboratory” was the motto, and his research on the language of dolphins and whales – as well as psychedelics and sensory deprivation – assured his own cult status in 20th-century pop culture as the basis for Ken Russel’s Altered States and Mike Nichols’s The Day of the Dolphin. Directors Michael Almareyda and Courtney Stephens, along with narrator Chloë Sevigny, explore the life of a determined scientist and his experiments into the psychonautical unknown.
January 31, 2025
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Production Grant
9 people
Chloë Sevigny
Narrator (voice)
Acting
Alejandro Jodorowsky
Self
Directing
Allen Ginsberg
Self (archive footage)
Acting
Timothy Leary
Self (archive footage)
Acting
Scott McVay
Self
Acting
Hella McVay
Self
Acting
Diana Reiss
Self
Acting
Gigi Coyle
Self
Acting
John Cunningham Lilly
Himself (archive footage)
Crew
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