The doc that shall live in infamy

Also known as THE MUSHROOM DOC. Oh the Mushroom Doc! How I adore thee.

Simply put: the Mushroom Doc is *amazing*. Quite possibly the most amazing film you shall ever see in your life, if you are so priviledged. More amazing than Citizen Kane you ask? I would say yes. Clearly, your life is not complete until you see the Mushroom Doc.

So, what is all this Mushroom Doc nonsense about? Other than an inane post on my blog? It's utter genius I tell you.

While I was up in Maine this summer, the posties would occasionally make mention to something called "The Mushroom Doc". At one point, they wanted to make t-shirts about the mushroom doc. Obviously I was oblivious to what they were talking about. (That and who the hell were all the Lost characters they named the hard drives after.) I always asked and was always told "You haven't seen the Mushroom Doc??! We'll have to dig it out sometime". And then it was never dug out.

Until one day, it actually was unearthed. And much, much enjoyment was had. The mushroom doc was a Workshop student documentary from 2 years ago. It was the final project of a 4-week Documentary Film school student, and obviously was about mushrooms. Rumor has it the filmmaker didn't want it to be shown, but the instructor insisted. Ever since then, the reputation of the Mushroom doc filtered through the campus, year after year, much the unknown horror of the original filmmaker I'm sure.

The Mushroom Doc is the finest example I have ever seen of how NOT to do a film. Every mistake you could possibly make is in there. There are black frames, horrendous jump cuts, mics not turned on, heinous talent, shitacular photography, disastrous sound mixing and also a camera getting rained on. With rain dripping down the lens. You could not make a worse film IF YOU TRIED. And that's what makes it so entertaining.

My friends and I watched it last night, and I swear it took us an hour to get through it, even though it's only 15 minutes long. We laughed too much, needed to rewind and review the piece several times in order to experience the true beauty of the mushroom doc. The power of the mushroom doc is not only to entertain with it's sheer shittiness, but also to make us as filmmakers feel alot better about what we have accomplished. That and we also learn that a mushroom is a fruit.

*also this post is entertaining, since I don't think I could end more sentences with prepositions if I tried.