Videodrome
David Cronenberg is a massive influence in horror and the surreal. Famed for movies such as The Fly and more, the essence of his work and taking the banal world only to twist it on its head still provokes audiences everywhere. While his work may not attract a large commercial viewership, he has achieved critical acclaim for his work of provoking the psychological glare and disturbing mental nightmares. More known for science fiction and horror, he is heralded as a man before his time and still perpetuates that with movies such as Cosmopolis and this year’s Maps To The Stars.
But nothing polarises people as much as his spectacular cinematic feast, Videodrome.
Starring Deborah Harry and James Woods, Videodrome revolves around Max Renn, the head of a small television channel which showcases porn and uncouth programming. During the hunt to find something never seen before, Renn comes across a snuff film called Videodrome, that changes everytime he sees it. However, there is something much more to the movie than meets the eye and as Renn starts to hallucinate about the video tape. Taking you on a sexual sadomasochist journey of the graphic and perturbed, Cronenberg presents a horror flick that encapsulates late night viewing of the eighties and still manages to be ahead of its time.
Of course, the first thing you’ll note about Videodrome is, frankly, the bat-shit insane visuals. Utilising special effects, make up and aesthetics that would later make his name in The Fly, Cronenberg presents imagery that is creepy and horrific. For want of a better phrases, it is bat-shit insane and the visuals are meant to maim and intrude your psyche. These flickering visuals and toil with reality produce effective thrills and chills.
What is interesting in Videodrome was the themes it presents, particularly the feminine spirits within here. While the women here do represent the archetypal tropes that fiction have used here all the time, the femme fatale, the saint and the mother; each women transcends it and presents dual personalities. Masha is a self-proclaimed feminist but peddles soft core porn. Bianca works at a missionary helping the homeless but still recycles her father’s work and videodrome. The most interesting is Nicki, she is a psychiatrist that lends a mothering and comforting ear to her listens, complains that the world is high sexualised but claims her own sexuality. Played brilliantly by Debbie Harry, Nicki likes pain during sex and that is something she claims for herself, that she owns. Especially in the beginning, Videodrome surprisingly presents feminine qualities in an interesting way; full and rounded.
Conflicting with Renn’s attempt to claim his own Id like tendencies (after all, one could argue that “the new flesh” is a representation of his own repression and “Videodrome” has released it,) Videodrome is a film that was ridiculously ahead of its time. Even now it is met with a lot of backlash with people refusing to see the bigger picture other than the sexualised themes. Cronenberg, indeed, solidifies his “master of science fiction horror” title and challenges the audience to get under the skin. With the themes and the imagery colliding, Videodrome with haunt and you will devour it, constantly toying with the ideas presented her. Because first, it controls your mind…
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