Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus

Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus Photos

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Cast & Crew

Michael Cera

Jamie

Gaby Hoffmann

Crystal Fairy

Agustín Silva

Pilo

José Miguel Silva

Lel

Juan Andrés Silva

Champa

Mariana Nicolich Aristich

Gypsy

Garciela Gonzalez Cruz

Mrs. Pachita

Sebastián Silva

Lobo

Sebastián Silva

Director

Sebastián Silva

Screenwriter

Juan de Dios Larraín

Producer

Pablo Larraín

Producer

Cristián Petit-Laurent

Cinematographer

Diego Macho

Film Editing

Sebastián Silva

Film Editing

Sofía Subercaseaux

Film Editing

Mark Grattan

Art Director

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News & Interviews for Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus

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Critic Reviews for Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus

Audience Reviews for Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus

• Dec 22, 2013

  Oh Michael Cera. How you have become the oddity of acting of our age group since Super Bad. The movie itself was average. Most critics really were high on this at some of the film festivals, but I found it a tad difficult to sit through when the main premise of the movie was to get high on mescaline. Cera puts in one of the most irritable performances I can remember while watching a movie. There were times when you just feel like choking him. I haven't seen too much of Gaby Hoffman, but I think after this film I've certainly seen more than enough. A bold performance for sure to bare it all for such a long period of filming. The Spanish speaking actors were pretty average. I was actually disappointed the drug trip didn't really blow me away for the second half of the movie. I was expecting a little more and it came up a little short. Usually when you watch movies about taking drugs you at least expect to live vicariously through the actors, but I felt more like one of the characters who didn't take the drug just watching everyone from the outside.
  

  Super Reviewer
• Dec 11, 2013

  * Sometimes I amaze myself at the movies I will sit through because it gets nominated for awards. This movie was up for some Spirit awards(actress, and a few others), it stars Michael Cera, so I figured Why Not? It's about a group traveling through Chile to get a drug out of a cactus to get high, then they have a bunch of drama amongst themselves on a beach. It has a few funny moments, but overall it's boring, incoherent, and just not very good or entertaining. I like Michael Cera, but this is one of his movies that is just dumb(kind of like how "Paper Heart" was dumb). The hippie girl he picks up played by Gaby Hoffman is good, but nowhere near deserving of any award nomination on any planet. This is weird, and a big time wasting movie(another gem I watched off of Netflix). Of course, I should be surprised that a movie called "Crystal Fairy and the Magical Cactus" is bad. Don't bother at all with this, unless you're on the drugs they are searching for.
  

  Super Reviewer
• Dec 01, 2013

  Have you seen any Chilean movies recently with Michael Cera? Here is one! Written and directed by Sebastián Silva, the full movie title as on the screen is "Crystal Fairy & The Magical Cactus and 2012". Of course, it premiered at the Sundance festival and Silva there said that his movie, which is based on a real-life encounter, is "about the birth of compassion in someone's life." It could be described like that, but as we know it is not the final destination which is important, it is the way someone arrives to it. And during this travel, most of the young men and one young woman arrived through dope, cocaine or even mescaline! The story of Jamie traveling in Chile, and attending the local party is so under the influence of cocaine that he couldn't even remember that he invited an eccentric woman to join his group's quest to score a fabled hallucinogen, a move that finds him at odds with his new companion, until they drink the magic brew on a beach at the edge of the desert. The words come together. I didn't get too excited even with the naked appearance and the unshaved part, most of the time it was just smooth sailing with a very low blow... I understand the director's approach and that Michael Cera was in Chile a week in Santiago in pre-production living together at Sebastián's parents' house-where he had filmed The Maid in 2009. The boys would sit out back playing guitar and singing songs. Gaby Hoffmann, (as Crystal Fairy, a radical spirit) recalls hearing the music steaming through the open doors while Sebastián and Hoffmann would sit at a desk where she created all Crystal Fairy's drawings in the sketchbook she has in the movie. The titular character is based on a real person who was an influence on the director. The script was an outline with every scene including a moment that leads the actors to the next place. They didn't do any rehearsals in character, but since the boys had already been living together when Hoffmann arrived, her character's role as the outsider was easier to slip into. While shooting the scene of Crystal Fairy tripping, Hoffmann was too. "...I just knew it would be okay. My dose was weak, so I had to take a second one even though it was so revolting, but I really loved it. I was totally present in the experience of the making of the movie, and I felt like it was subtle enough that I could step in and out of it," Hoffmann said. "I never felt like, 'Oh my God, I'm tripping and I have to make a movie.' I felt like I could totally step out of it and be like, 'Okay, Sebastián, what's going on? What do we need to do?' And then I could step back into it and just go with it. And, you know, there's like hours and hours of footage that you don't see because it was like a 10-hour trip and we were in that desert the whole time. It was great, but it was subtle." You heard the explanation, watch the movie, and that is exactly what are you going to see: someone tripping for a long time, and we are watching and paying!
  

  Super Reviewer
• Aug 21, 2013

  Uptight drug tourist Jamie (a shaggy Micheal Cera) has spent months planning a night of tripping on a hallucinogenic cactus with his Chilean hosts, but is annoyed when a free-spirited hippy chick named Crystal Fairy (an unshaven Gaby Hoffman) tags along with her own ideas about how to conduct the ceremony. There aren't too many surprises in this manic-fairy-trip-girl drama, but it's notable for the acting, and because it covers a unique psychedelic subculture that rarely makes it into the movies.
  

  Super Reviewer