I Need a Ride to California (1968)

New York 1968, a rare film about a bygone era. Late '60s, Greenwich Village: Lilly is a young Californian who came to New York to experience the hippie revolution head on. She explores the streets of the metropolis, camera in hand, a wreath in her hair. But Lilly will quickly realize that the city and the people she meets are not as benevolent as she imagined. Shot by Morris Engel after his famous New York trilogy at a time when the flower power revolution was in full swing, I Need A Ride to California is a remarkable testimony to New York at the end of the 1960s. For his first color fiction, the filmmaker is inspired by the climate of sexual liberation and social unrest, as well as psychedelic fashion, to portray a complex, sometimes raw portrait of a young girl let loose in the Manhattan of counter-culture. A rare and precious work.