Gambling, Gods and LSD

An intuitive undertaking by a visionary film maker. A stream of events, people and images that touch on a plethora of phenomena. Churchgoers in ecstasy, the collapse of a hotel in Las Vegas, a woman talking to God, the inventor of LSD and an Indian director in Switzerland all turn out to fit into a strange vision of what may be an even stranger world. With his exquisite and meticulously chosen images of journeys through mythical worlds, Mettler succeeds in linking a number of apparently very different phenomena at least visually to each other.
Mettler’s journey starts in his home town of Toronto and leads via the desert of Nevada and his birthplace Switzerland to India. Everywhere he meets people who drive themselves to the limits, both mentally and physically, because they are convinced that they can find an answer in the extreme.
Should you think that the genre of creative documentary has become bogged down in mannerism and aesthetics, then Mettler proves the opposite. The film is a hypnotic combination of Mettler’s lyrical camerawork and a very effective soundtrack, embracing all kinds of excesses in intoxicating impressions.