A staggeringly awful youth-gone-bad film, Around The Fire carries the unusual distinction of ineptly condemning the lifestyle of its only conceivable audience, Phish-heads attracted to its hippie themes and jam-band-intensive soundtrack. The film opens with clean-cut protagonist Devon Sawa stealing a pen (a move that clearly foreshadows his transformation into a sullen, hopped-up, drug-dealing acid freak), and from there it's only a matter of time before he's smoking weed and engaging in comical acid freakouts. It all starts innocently enough, with Sawa's angry-pothead roommate (Eric Mabius) asking him what kind of music he likes, but soon enough Sawa is descending into the shadowy netherworld of tie-dyed, stick-twirling, dreadlocked white people who accompany the endless touring of an unnamed Phish-like group. It's easy to understand why no reputable jam band would want to appear in the film, as Around The Fire is a laughably ham-fisted piece of propaganda with an attitude toward casual drug use that makes Nancy Reagan sound like a blunt-toting Rastafarian. Bad in a way that only films that think they're saying something important can really be, Around The Fire is about as fun to watch as the slow, agonizing death of a loved one. Given the movie's hysterically overwrought anti-drug message, there's irony in the fact that it would take a joint the size of a Louisville Slugger to make first-time director John Jacobsen's film watchable or interesting.