Review: Videodrome
Blu-ray: Videodrome (1983)
Max Renn, owner of a schlock shock independent TV channel is on the lookout for new content to broadcast. Coming across a programme/video called Videodrome, he becomes embroiled in a sado-masochistic dream-like alternate life. Is it real? Is he bonkers? Only David Cronenberg knows.
Ah yes, that sounds like a bit of a fly synopsis, but the truth of the matter is David Cronenberg is one of those directors, like David Lynch, and Ken Russell, who play by their own rules and give us Psycho-horror-sex-death-guts brilliance. There’s not a lot I can say about this film that hasn’t been said a million times before. The story is pretty straight forward, man (James Woods; seedy, greedy and suitably horrified and confused) meets girl (Debbie Harry, who gives a fantastically sultry performance as Nicki is a revelation), man sticks pins in girl, girl wants to be punished, man’s belly opens up and… well it all ends in disaster. Or perhaps it ends with man adapting a higher consciousness through sado-masochism? Yes, it’s a film with many interpretations and to be honest, it doesn’t matter if you ‘don’t get it’, you don’t have to. You just have to watch and accept Cronenberg’s vision.
The special effects are fab, ALL practical, and even when you can see the join, they still make this film VIBRATE with body horror. Watching Woods push his face into a TV has to be one of the most iconic moments in film for me.
So how do I begin to talk about the package Arrow has put together? Just when you think they can’t get any better, they do THIS.
Again I could go through each individual bit of the box set; Cronenberg’s early works, the many documentaries, the fantastic round table talk with Mick Garris, John Carpenter, John Landis and Cronenberg, audio commentary by Tim Lucas and the really zingy new High Def transfer of the film itself. But hey, I’ll make it easy for you. I suggest if you haven’t already stared an ARROW collection, do it now. This package is genuinely awe inducing.
Review by Tina (co-host of 60 Minutes With) from a disc kindly supplied by Arrow Films.