You know, I’m always up for anything – I consider it a professional challenge worth accepting when a filmmaker releases something weird, complex, narratively circuitous; I just don’t care.

Well, I have met my match. Director/Writer Peter Strickland has out-weirded me. I surrender. He wins.

His latest film, Flux Gourmet would have played as a Midnight Movie in the mid-1970s. There would have been a cloud of pot smoke above the audience, and patrons would have stared at the big screen with glassy eyes and said, “Far out, man,” every few minutes or so.

But watching at home, stone cold sober (I do not drink or take drugs) and without a group of friends in faded denim jackets to slouch in the seats are stare…I just couldn’t do it, man. Three tries to make it to the end.

So what’s it about? It’s about a troupe of artsy-fartsy weirdos who live in a remote artistic institution; it’s like a residency so that these artists can stay on site while they work on…

I sh*t you not – they’re working on recording the sounds of various foods. They call it “sonic catering”; sticking long skinny microphones into food and amplifying the sounds for..well, um, art?

There is exactly one character with whom the audience can relate (Greek actor Makis Papadimitriou); he’s a dude, almost a journalist, who is hired to witness, write about and photograph the rituals of the “artists.” He, too, is flummoxed by the eccentricities of every other person in the building, from the Director on down.

For some reason known only to Strickland (I guess this is where the “black comedy” comes in) our outsider and guide into this realm is having serious, very serious gas problems and all he can initially think about is trying to suppress his flatulence, lest it become a serious embarrassment. After all, he is living there, too.

If there is any narrative arc to the story, it’s that our journalist guide realizes he is slowly becoming part of this collective himself.

But don’t listen to me; the film has an 84% approval on Rotten Tomatoes as of today.

I have not read those reviews to see what the critics saw that eluded me, but I wonder if they were sitting behind me with an audibly gurgling bong in the theater, circa 1975.

Flux Gourmet is currently streaming on Shudder \ 1 out of 4 Stars