3 Friends Explore The Obscure And Potent Substance 5-MeO-DMT In This Existentially Intense Film Doc

“Are some doors better left unopened?” That is the ultimate question three friends ask themselves in the captivating documentary film 5MEO. 

On a quest to recapture some excitement and intrigue in their middle years, filmmakers Boris Jänsch, Frank McCaughey and Charles Turley set out to experience for the first time the potent psychoactive substance 5-MeO-DMT. Most notably derived from the Sonoran Desert toad’s defense secretions, the vaporized material can deliver transcendent, otherworldly experiences which often have the effect of blowing apart one’s tidy idea of reality. Its onset is typically within seconds of smoking and effects tend to last for just 10 to 20 minutes on average — a short duration compared to many psychedelics that can buzz on for hours. 

For two of the film’s three participants (Jänsch and Turley), it is their first-ever go at a big psychedelic undertaking. That stark fact creates some anxiety early on in the film as the three men embark on a dress rehearsal prior to their 5-MeO-DMT experience. Each takes a large quantity of psychoactive magic mushrooms — roughly 5 to 7 grams apiece — or what’s known as a “heroic dose.” At that high dosage users typically experience ego dissolution, which can provide a mixed bag of outcomes — some good, some not so good. Their psychoactive prep-work using psychedelic mushrooms is meant to create a sort of topographical framework of the psychedelic landscape they’ll encounter when traversing the environment of their eventual toad venom voyage. Really though, there’s no way to be prepared.

For all the anxiety brought on by the uncertainty of their upcoming trip with 5-MeO-DMT, the filmmakers do a great job at keeping their feet on the ground through the process. There are some funny interchanges, like McCaughey’s small fear that the substance might change him in some fundamentally unwelcomed way. “I don’t want five telling me I can’t have a glass of wine and a ciggy,” he says. “I like havin’ a ciggy.”

You can’t help but pull for these guys throughout the arc of their journey. They’re just ordinary people searching for a deeper understanding of life. What they’re doing is certainly extraordinary — and perhaps even a little risky — but in the end it’s just three regular humans openly examining themselves and laying bare their fears and desires for a fuller life. And oh yeah — they happen to be chronicling it all in front of a camera.

“I've heard people identify with one person or another in the movie,” says McCaughey over a recent call from his home in Ireland. “There's kind of a little piece of somebody in all of us.” 

The film is sprinkled throughout with intimate and thought-provoking sentiments from before and after their psychedelic excursions, like Turley’s admission early on that his life had become something like an old suit that no longer fit him well. Having lived through a cancer diagnosis, he is ready for the big experience: “I feel sort of pleased with myself and vaguely heroic,” he says of his future foray. 

In some ways 5MEO is reminiscent in tone to the 2003 documentary Touching the Void, a stunning film detailing the true story of a harrowing mountaineering adventure in the Andes. It evokes a similar quiet and cool composure in the face of distressing circumstances, told through honest, introspective interviews. The mountain climbing analogy is a fitting one, too, as the three men harness themselves in for the serious mental expedition ahead, where the air is sure to be thinner and the future existentially uncertain.

“With these moments, I describe them as existential shock,” says Jänsch after his time under the influence of the substance. “Shock isn’t a positive word necessarily.” 

McCaughey likens it to a weapon of mass destruction. “Somebody used the words: ‘an existentially violent thing to happen.’ It's probably a good way to describe the experience in terms of how fast the onset is and how rapid and huge it is. It's kind of an unfathomable experience for the mind to capture.” 

5MEO hits the mark squarely in part due to its fascinating and strange subject matter, like a scene pulled from a fairytale. But more than that, 5MEO is interesting viewing based on the artistic and technical capabilities of its three creators. McCaughey is a born storyteller with experience as a filmmaker and podcaster, having interviewed the likes of psychedelic icon Dennis McKenna, among many other personalities. And Jänsch and Turley, similarly well-spoken, have previous experience working together on Jänsch’s film — Who's Driving the Dreambus? — which features a series of interviews with eminent writers, spiritual teachers and philosophers unravelling what it means to be alive. 

In the end the film does a great service by portraying this powerful psychedelic substance as something not to dabble in lightly (and the trio’s guide uses a synthetic version of the substance, a bonus as Sonoran toad populations are being threatened). While 5MEO may not fully answer the question about the prudence of leaving the door unopened, the film does provide a compelling view from the outside and a tiny shaft of light from which the rest of us can make an informed choice for ourselves. 5MEO is available here on Vimeo.

This article was originally published on Forbes and appears here with permission.