The Cronenberg Thread

turns out he's a documentarian

I'm hoping for a sexier virus like in Shivers.

Finally saw History of Violence. I liked it a lot but maybe not as much as Eastern Promises. The thing that bothered me most was that I thought it indulged a little too much in the male fantasy of being the secret ultimate badass. One of the great things about the famous steam room fight scene -- one of the greatest fight scenes of all time -- is that it really feels like he could lose and be killed, and therefore it really feels like life itself is at stake. Somehow the violence in History of Violence never quite reaches that visceral intensity, he always comes off as too much of an action hero, as nasty as he gets. The climactic scene felt tired and familiar, fighting the end boss and taking out all his dudes in the big mansion. It was Road House, it was Ghost Dog, it was a million other movies. I don't know where else the movie could have gone really, but it was overly contrived to have him finally kill ALL the guys from his past, including his own brother, and get on with his life. Other things felt very real to me - showing one's worst in a relationship and then getting on with it, both people deeply wounded.

William Hurt was very funny as the brother, fwiw, yet it still felt like a character I had seen too many times.

not that I am any expert on fighting to the death, but I imagine there is always a certain amount of chance involved even if someone is a trained killer. Eastern Promises captures that, History of Violence doesn't. I don't know if there's a reason for that or not. Maybe it's supposed to be a bit more cartoonish. It worked for me over all.

I think they're after different vibes tbh. Mortensen's seeming invulnerability in AHOV works for me because it doesn't help him master the part of his life he actually wants to preserve - if anything, his superpowers are a freakish liability.

Saw a trailer for a new film by his son a couple of weeks ago.

simon otm

Re-linking to J.G. Ballard's review, which proposes a different kind of perspective:
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2005/sep/23/jgballard

AHOV was based on a comic book...

I just noticed that Cosmopolis is available on Amazon Prime. Might watch that this weekend.

I read the comic years and years ago, iirc it was a lot more generic hardboiled crime and WAY more graphically violent

Mortensen's seeming invulnerability in AHOV works for me because it doesn't help him master the part of his life he actually wants to preserve

Yup. The critique of masculinity was also going on.

File under filmmakers i keep trying to like but can't get into. Tried watching The Brood last night and found it just a brutal slog. I just have no clue what people get out of this movie other than the big gross out at the end. Its like he used up all his imagination on the body-horror stuff and didnt have any left over for the rest of the film. All that brown and beige, all those interminable bland shots of people getting in and out of cars, opening doors, walking down hallways, sitting down in nondescript barely-decorated rooms, slowly reading their lines to each other. Maybe he was going for 'stately pace', but it just gave me Corman vibes instead tbh. I couldnt hold in the giggles during the scene when the father in law is mourning his dead ex wife, which Cronenberg opts to depict by having him literally weeping and caressing the chalk outline of her dead body.

Should I keep going? I've watched just about everything up to The Fly. If thats the only one that I've liked, is there a chance of me finding anything beyond it that'll work for me, or should I just chalk it up as Not For Me?

At least give Naked Lunch a shot.

I'm not a big fan of "The Brood." Have you seen Videodrome? If you haven't, you should. If you did and didn't like it, maybe take your foot off the gas a bit, but fwiw "The Fly" and "The Dead Zone" are the first ones (after "Videodrome") where he gets budgets and performances on par with his ideas. HIs post "Fly" work is kind of erratic - sometimes his ideas get the better of him, or at least are let down by their corresponding budgets, like "Naked Lunch" - but "Dead Ringers" is pretty incredible, "eXistenZ" fun, "Crash" worth watching, "Eastern Promises" and "History of Violence" excellent vehicles for Viggo. After that ... eh.

Should I keep going? I've watched just about everything up to The Fly. If thats the only one that I've liked, is there a chance of me finding anything beyond it that'll work for me, or should I just chalk it up as Not For Me?

IMO none of the movies he made after The Fly (except M Butterfly which I have not seen) are bad, though some are more interesting than others. tough to go wrong w/ Naked Lunch, Crash, or AHOV. the recent ones are stan-only affairs, more or less. I also have a soft spot for A Dangerous Method.

All that brown and beige, all those interminable bland shots of people getting in and out of cars, opening doors, walking down hallways, sitting down in nondescript barely-decorated rooms, slowly reading their lines to each other.

Sounds good to me, Cronenberg in a nutshell.

Haha, yeah, sign me up for that. (The Brood is my favorite of the early stuff.)

But then again Cosmopolis might be my favorite of the post Crash stuff, so I'm probably not to be trusted.

I really liked Cosmopolis, but really hated Maps to the Stars, perhaps the first of his movies I thought was outright bad across the board

Has anyone read Steve Bissette's monograph about The Brood?

https://www.pspublishing.co.uk/the-brood-hardcover-by-stephen-r-bissette-4784-p.asp

For me, one of the pleasing bonuses of early Cronenberg is all that beige 70s Canadian decor - I especially love the shopping mall in the opening of Scanners.

oh my word, I want that!

690 pages is ... a lot for a monograph.

I watched Rabid a couple of days ago and was pretty underwhelmed. His early films have a slightly boring sameness to me. He really takes off in the 80s though.

Scanners suffers from a boring lead and leans hard on its gonzo climax, but it's more than worth it to get there imo

yeah I think part of my trouble is ive had a hard time with some of the milquetoast leads in these pre-Fly ones. I always forget he did those 2 with Viggo, I should probably check one of those out

The only thing I like about his early horror films are the brown and beige hallways and the people getting in and out of cars, largely out of Canadian nostalgia. Once the gore starts, I lose interest.

Admittedly, my taste in his films is unusual. I love Stereo, Crimes of the Future, Crash and Spider. I hate The Fly, Dead Ringers and Naked Lunch (though the latter is my favourite book).

Rabid and Shivers are both A+ ideas with the best execution money can buy, which is to say, no money, so shaky execution. Sort of like Romero's "The Crazies." "Videodrome" is his great leap forward in conception, ambition and execution.

Steve Bissette's Brood bk, mentioned above, is currently one of the publisher's Black Friday specials:

https://pspublishing2.com/?fbclid=IwAR1EJehuL_QH4fffDSn0E8ofawi6qW0oa6X24L04mo3d84LsGoiwDGBk4Ls

His son's in on the act now!

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/nov/26/possessor-review-brandon-cronenberg-andrea-riseborough-sc0fi-horror

I watched Possessor a few weeks ago and it was really fucking great. Highly recommended.

hmm -- I don't agree. It's humorless and rather derivative. But keep your eye on him.

I laughed a few times

Somehow I'd enjoy it more if Cronenberg's offspring made fluffy romcoms.

Crash Into Me

saw The Dead Zone for the first time, liked it more than I though I would

It's my favourite Cronenberg, and would be my favourite King adaptation if The Shining didn't exist.

To this day, my sister still refers to The Dead Zone as "that movie with the scissors."

it has an unsettling mood, like the moment WAlken gets a headache on the rollercoaster.

plus we have our own President Stillson now

Except Tr*mp would feel no shame about having used a toddler as a human shield.

THAT BABY WAS A RINO!!!

i watched shivers the other day and thought it was excellent

gooood that one creeped me out

https://www.indiewire.com/2021/04/david-cronenberg-sci-fi-movie-crimes-of-the-future-shoot-1234633841/

The original Crimes of the Future is my favourite film of his, maybe my favourite of all time. The article implies the new film only shares its title, but doesn't provide any other details?

Here to remind you that David Cronenberg had the best and most David Cronenberg take on streaming vs. theatrical: pic.twitter.com/3rkKsweHxB

— Jane Schoenbrun (@janeschoenbrun) April 28, 2021

I still can't figure out if this new one relates at all to the old "Crimes" which is awesome

https://variety.com/2021/film/global/david-cronenberg-crimes-of-the-future-viggo-mortensen-1235033420/

According to promotional materials, the film takes a deep dive into the not-so-distant future where humankind is learning to adapt to its synthetic surroundings. This evolution moves humans beyond their natural state and into a metamorphosis known as “Accelerated Evolution Syndrome” that alters their biological makeup. While some embrace the limitless potential of “transhumanism,” others attempt to police it.

From the list of performers, it sounds as if he is reusing the general premise of biological metamorphosis, but not that all the women in the world have died from "Rouge's Malady".

So I guess the "Dead Ringers" series is really going forward, huh?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVX7df79BNo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGwtPfjt9Zc