MAYBE LOGIC dvd review

MAYBE LOGIC (The Disinfo Company DVD)

Review by Kent Manthie

Another product from the amazing disinformation company; this one is a DVD focused on Robert Anton Wilson, whose “Illuminatus Trilogy” and “Cosmic Trigger…” are influential underground classics, has expanded the mind of many. Maybe Logic is a the new DVD from our pals at the DISINFO COMPANY, full of all sorts of wisdom, questions, insights and different appearances from the past plus Bob at home. It is a feature length documentary that, at 82 minutes, is wall-to-wall BOB. But even better is you get to see and hear all the different pieces of the puzzle that makes up his interesting mind!
There are two or three different Bobs in this movie. One you see is the formerly healthy, chubby guy, big full face, short shock of white hair and a matching white goatee. Then there is the Mr. Natural look-alike, half the weight of the first Bob, voice a bit higher and labored due to the illness that is attacking him. The guy who is the third Bob is the guy who you see throughout, in small segments, sitting in the recliner, white beard trimmed down, hair cropped, big white shirt on , skinny as hell; that is the most recent one, as he was at the time the film was released or, rather, just before it was finished.
In his mid-to-late 70s now, he looks about 98 – the result of suffering: wasting away and intense pain which is due to “post-polio syndrome”. Wilson had polio as a child, was cured by the “Sister Kenny Method” and then went on to grow up and become the interesting guy we all know and love until this PPS sneaked up and bashed him in the kneecaps, so to speak.
Futurist, playwright, screenwriter, stand-up comic, lecturer, author and all around mind-blowing, consciousness-expanding dude, Robert Anton Wilson is in the same modes of psychedelic philosophy as Timothy Leary, Philip K. Dick, even back to people like Joseph Campbell, Aleister Crowley and Giordano Bruno from as far back as the 16th century. It is kind of sad to see how Bob’s body has gone to pieces, but one is heartened, at least, to see that his mind is still there, quick as ever, still the same Bob, after all.
With appearances by Rev. Ivan Stang (of the Church of the Subgenius), author Tom Robbins, futuristic writer, bon vivant, R.U. Sirius; plus Douglass Rushkoff and cultural icon, Paul Krassner, Maybe Logic is one hell of a mind-opening trip (http://www.disinfo.com) – KM.