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The Master of Body Horror: A David Cronenberg Horror Retrospective

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Horror master David Cronenberg is hitting a major milestone on March 15th, with his 75th birthday. The Canadian-born writer, director, and actor was a major innovator of the body horror subgenre, and has long revulsed audiences with his visceral brand of psychological and bodily transformation horror. His untraditional, personal filmmaking translating on screen as some of horror’s most uncomfortable, surreal journeys sets him apart. While he’s long since departed from genre films, his work is still relevant today. With a remake of Rabid underway, and a recent announcement that rights have been acquired to adapt Scanners as a TV series, to say the auteur still has a firm hold on horror would be an understatement. To celebrate such a major milestone, we look back at Cronenberg’s major contributions to horror and what made them so great:


As Director

Shivers

After two art-house features and numerous shorts, Cronenberg went into partnership with producer Ivan Reitman and unleashed Shivers upon Canadian audiences. Also known as The Parasite Murders or They Came from Within, Cronenberg’s first major feature followed a strain of parasites infecting residents of a suburban high-rise apartment building, turning them into rage-filled, sex-crazed fiends that in turn infect others with sexual contact. The violence and sexual content meant the release was met with a lot of controversies. Shot in a short 15 days, Cronenberg’s major debut may have infuriated critics, but from a horror perspective, it’s a brutal, bleak voyage through terror that marks the beginning of the director’s gross-out body horror.


Rabid

Rabid-1997

A unique twist to the zombie formula in a way only Cronenberg could deliver, in which a young woman undergoes experimental plastic surgery after a severe crash, leaving her with a hunger for human blood. Her victims then turn into rabid zombies that then infect others, causing an epidemic. Cronenberg keeps to his intimate storytelling and body horror; the young woman stricken with newfound bloodthirst feeds by way of a stinger that emerges from her armpit. Cronenberg initially wanted to cast Sissy Spacek as the woman, but the studio overruled because of her accent. So, porn star Marilyn Chambers was cast instead.


The Brood

Best Horror Films

Considered by Cronenberg to be one of the most classic horror films that he ever did, it’s also very autobiographical. During development, Cronenberg was fighting for custody of his daughters from his first marriage. Starring Oliver Reed and Samantha Eggar, this twisty sci-fi psychological horror film follows a psychologist’s therapy on his institutionalized wife during a series of brutal murders committed by a brood of mutant children. It grossed out the critics at the time of release, particularly for the scene that featured Eggar eating her own afterbirth. A great horror classic, it also marks the score debut from Howard Shore.


Scanners

A futuristic sci-fi thriller that centers around industrial conspiracy and espionage as a scientist sends a man, Revok, with extraordinary psychic powers to hunt down others like him. The head explosion scene is forever iconic, but Cronenberg has called this one the most frustrating film he’d ever made due to the forced rush job through production. Filming had to begin without a finished script, making the director write and direct simultaneously. The first of Cronenberg’s films that spawned sequels, though he wasn’t involved.


Videodrome

One of Cronenberg’s most beloved films by fans, it follows James Woods as a sleazy cable TV programmer whose life begins to spiral out of control once he stumbles about a broadcast signal featuring extreme torture. The concept stemmed from Cronenberg’s childhood when he used to pick up television signals from Buffalo, New York after Canadian channels had gone off air and his childhood worry of seeing something not meant for public eyes. The surreal imagery combined with special effects master Rick Baker’s work on the film combined to create one of the strangest, entrancing horror films way ahead of its time.


The Dead Zone

One of only three of Cronenberg’s films to not have been scored by Howard Shore, and the first major studio film directed by Cronenberg, The Dead Zone was adapted for the screen by Jeffrey Boam based on Stephen King’s novel. Even as a major studio film, Cronenberg still filmed in his home province of Ontario. Christopher Walken plays the empathetic Johnny Smith, a teacher with a future ahead of him until an accident lands him in a coma. When he wakes years later, life has moved on without him, and the discovery that he now has a psychic ability becomes a blessing and a curse.


The Fly

The only film directed by Cronenberg to win an Oscar (for Best Makeup), this magnum opus is one of the best horror movies of all time. A tragic love story that plays out like an opera, Seth Brundle’s transformation into a grotesque human fly while his lover, Veronica Quaife, helplessly watches on was made more compelling by Cronenberg’s revisions to Charles Pogue’s original screenplay. He kept the basic concepts the same, but injected his trademark themes of sexuality, personal identity crisis, and body horror. So much more body horror. Thank you, Cronenberg.


Dead Ringers

The last of Cronenberg’s true horror films follow twin gynecologists who spiral out of control in drug addiction and codependency once a new woman enters their life. Jeremy Irons played the dual role of twin brothers Elliot and Beverly Mantle. Checking off all the requisite Cronenberg boxes, from intimacy, sexuality, and downbeat tone, Dead Ringers is more subdued than previous efforts in that the director delves more into the psychological over shocking imagery- though there is that here too. A deep character study with masterful double performances by Irons, Dead Ringers is extremely unsettling, and often overlooked.


eXistenZ

Though classified as sci-fi, this 1999 release still bears Cronenberg’s characteristic body horror and is a great thrill ride that genre fans will love. Jennifer Jason Leigh plays a game designer on the run from assassins, who must play her latest VR game with a marketing trainee to test if the game has been tampered with. A mind-bending psychological examination of how humans interact with surrounding technology, or in this case, video games, Cronenberg delivers on the weird and surreal. It may sound all techno-pulp, but the gooey body horror still applies.


As Actor

Cronenberg can often be spotted in cameo roles, from the Gynecologist in a nightmare sequence in The Fly to small appearances in John Landis’ comedy Into the Night. But when he steps into a more prominent role on screen, the director proves to be a jack of all trades. Some of his more notable horror acting roles include:

Nightbreed

It’s not the monsters that you should be afraid of in this Clive Barker film, but the cool, calculated Dr. Phillip K. Decker, a psychotherapist who moonlights as a masked serial killer. Cronenberg is chilling as the film’s antagonist, his intelligence translating on-screen in making Decker a formidable, deadly foe for Midian and its inhabitants. In a film full of creatively designed creatures, Cronenberg’s Decker stands out.


Resurrection

Russell Mulcahy (Highlander) reteams with Christopher Lambert in this Canadian production of a grisly serial killer procedural by way of Se7en. This film’s killer is one that uses missing body parts to rebuild the body of Christ in the nick of time for Easter, and Cronenberg this time plays a priest, Father Roussell.


Jason X

Before Jason Voorhees was cryogenically frozen and ended up in space, he was captured and kept in stasis by the U.S. government. Cronenberg played Dr. Wimmer, a scientist researching Jason’s cellular regeneration. Of course, this is the beginning of the movie, so Dr. Wimmer and his military team don’t last long at all. Yup. Cronenberg gets slaughtered by Jason Voorhees in this over-the-top sequel.

Horror journalist, RT Top Critic, and Critics Choice Association member. Co-Host of the Bloody Disgusting Podcast. Has appeared on PBS series' Monstrum, served on the SXSW Midnighter shorts jury, and moderated horror panels for WonderCon and SeriesFest.

Editorials

‘Leprechaun Returns’ – The Charm of the Franchise’s Legacy Sequel

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leprechaun returns

The erratic Leprechaun franchise is not known for sticking with a single concept for too long. The namesake (originally played by Warwick Davis) has gone to L.A., Las Vegas, space, and the ‘hood (not once but twice). And after an eleven-year holiday since the Davis era ended, the character received a drastic makeover in a now-unmentionable reboot. The critical failure of said film would have implied it was time to pack away the green top hat and shillelagh, and say goodbye to the nefarious imp. Instead, the Leprechaun series tried its luck again.

The general consensus for the Leprechaun films was never positive, and the darker yet blander Leprechaun: Origins certainly did not sway opinions. Just because the 2014 installment took itself seriously did not mean viewers would. After all, creator Mark Jones conceived a gruesome horror-comedy back in the early nineties, and that format is what was expected of any future ventures. So as horror legacy sequels (“legacyquels”) became more common in the 2010s, Leprechaun Returns followed suit while also going back to what made the ‘93 film work. This eighth entry echoed Halloween (2018) by ignoring all the previous sequels as well as being a direct continuation of the original. Even ardent fans can surely understand the decision to wipe the slate clean, so to speak.

Leprechaun Returns “continued the [franchise’s] trend of not being consistent by deciding to be consistent.” The retconning of Steven Kostanski and Suzanne Keilly’s film was met with little to no pushback from the fandom, who had already become accustomed to seeing something new and different with every chapter. Only now the “new and different” was familiar. With the severe route of Origins a mere speck in the rearview mirror, director Kotanski implemented a “back to basics” approach that garnered better reception than Zach Lipovsky’s own undertaking. The one-two punch of preposterous humor and grisly horror was in full force again.

LEPRECHAUN

Pictured: Linden Porco as The Leprechaun in Leprechaun Returns.

With Warwick Davis sitting this film out — his own choice — there was the foremost challenge of finding his replacement. Returns found Davis’ successor in Linden Porco, who admirably filled those blood-stained, buckled shoes. And what would a legacy sequel be without a returning character? Jennifer Aniston obviously did not reprise her final girl role of Tory Redding. So, the film did the next best thing and fetched another of Lubdan’s past victims: Ozzie, the likable oaf played by Mark Holton. Returns also created an extension of Tory’s character by giving her a teenage daughter, Lila (Taylor Spreitler).

It has been twenty-five years since the events of the ‘93 film. The incident is unknown to all but its survivors. Interested in her late mother’s history there in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, Lila transferred to the local university and pledged a sorority — really the only one on campus — whose few members now reside in Tory Redding’s old home. The farmhouse-turned-sorority-house is still a work in progress; Lila’s fellow Alpha Epsilon sisters were in the midst of renovating the place when a ghost of the past found its way into the present.

The Psycho Goreman and The Void director’s penchant for visceral special effects is noted early on as the Leprechaun tears not only into the modern age, but also through poor Ozzie’s abdomen. The portal from 1993 to 2018 is soaked with blood and guts as the Leprechaun forces his way into the story. Davis’ iconic depiction of the wee antagonist is missed, however, Linden Porco is not simply keeping the seat warm in case his predecessor ever resumes the part. His enthusiastic performance is accentuated by a rotten-looking mug that adds to his innate menace.

LEPRECHAUN RETURNS sequel

Pictured: Taylor Spreitler, Pepi Sonuga, and Sai Bennett as Lila, Katie and Rose in Leprechaun Returns.

The obligatory fodder is mostly young this time around. Apart from one luckless postman and Ozzie — the premature passing of the latter character removed the chance of caring about anyone in the film — the Leprechaun’s potential prey are all college aged. Lila is this story’s token trauma kid with caregiver baggage; her mother thought “monsters were always trying to get her.” Lila’s habit of mentioning Tory’s mental health problem does not make a good first impression with the resident mean girl and apparent alcoholic of the sorority, Meredith (Emily Reid). Then there are the nicer but no less cursorily written of the Alpha Epsilon gals: eco-conscious and ex-obsessive Katie (Pepi Sonuga), and uptight overachiever Rose (Sai Bennett). Rounding out the main cast are a pair of destined-to-die bros (Oliver Llewellyn Jenkins, Ben McGregor). Lila and her peers range from disposable to plain irritating, so rooting for any one of them is next to impossible. Even so, their overstated personalities make their inevitable fates more satisfying.

Where Returns excels is its death sequences. Unlike Jones’ film, this one is not afraid of killing off members of the main cast. Lila, admittedly, wears too much plot armor, yet with her mother’s spirit looming over her and the whole story — comedian Heather McDonald put her bang-on Aniston impersonation to good use as well as provided a surprisingly emotional moment in the film — her immunity can be overlooked. Still, the other characters’ brutal demises make up for Lila’s imperviousness. The Leprechaun’s killer set-pieces also happen to demonstrate the time period, seeing as he uses solar panels and a drone in several supporting characters’ executions. A premortem selfie and the antagonist’s snarky mention of global warming additionally add to this film’s particular timestamp.

Critics were quick to say Leprechaun Returns did not break new ground. Sure, there is no one jetting off to space, or the wacky notion of Lubdan becoming a record producer. This reset, however, is still quite charming and entertaining despite its lack of risk-taking. And with yet another reboot in the works, who knows where the most wicked Leprechaun ever to exist will end up next.


Horror contemplates in great detail how young people handle inordinate situations and all of life’s unexpected challenges. While the genre forces characters of every age to face their fears, it is especially interested in how youths might fare in life-or-death scenarios.

The column Young Blood is dedicated to horror stories for and about teenagers, as well as other young folks on the brink of terror.

Leprechaun Returns movie

Pictured: Linden Porco as The Leprechaun in Leprechaun Returns.

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