I watched Videodrome, appropriately, on a worn VHS I rented back in high school. Oddly enough, I didn't play it on a tape deck slit into my gut (you'll understand the reference in a moment.) The experience was riveting - - another wonderfully-strange discovery from the tape stores I've paid such tribute to - - and I waxed rhapsodic about it to friends for years. However, because it would still be a long time before the Criterion DVD ever came out, I had to rely on my memory for these recommendations and, as viewing experiences do, my impression of the film distorted a little with time. It wasn't until I saw it again, uncut, on late-night cable a few years later that I was reminded, quite directly...
...that this is a very unsettling movie.
Horror’s a harder thing to evaluate as you get older. Your appreciation maybe even diminishes in inverse relation to your understanding of it. If you started off enjoying "scary movies" simply because you were looking for a good fright, then those scares inevitably diminish as you get used to the experience. The more you watch, the harder you are to scare.
One of the best descriptions of David Cronenberg I've heard is that he doesn't go for "bumps" or quick scares but opts, instead, to focus on something horrific with almost clinical detail. Where other directors will cut away quickly, he'll stay fixed on it with an unblinking, unflinching eye that lingers longer than you ever thought, or fear, it would. As such, Videodrome instills you with an ever-present sense of dread. Every frame's pregnant with the feeling that’s something’s wrong, and it's getting steadily worse.
And you get very little of that feeling in the trailer, which is totally 80s, totally pop art, totally MTV...
...and totally unrevealing about the plot. And maybe that was the right way to go, as the story isn't exactly something you can easily break down in five minutes for somebody waiting in line at the box office.
Basically, James Woods plays Max Renn, the programming director of a small-potatos cable channel that specializes in soft-core porn and gory schlock. As intense as his material is, he’s become bored with it and he's on an ever-unsatisfied search for “harder” material. When the station’s tech guy alerts him to a pirate broadcast called "Videodrome" coming from Pittsburgh (of course) that’s a 24/7 feed of naked prisoners getting tortured by burly, hooded men, Max is enraptured. This is exactly what he's been looking for. Believing Videodrome to be some kind of intense installation art - - a staged snuff film - - he heads to the Pittsburgh to find its creators and work out a syndication deal with them.
And that’s when things get weird…
Renn’s exposure to Videodrome starts mutating him, adding “new flesh” to his body, and distorting his consciousness with semi-real visions that pollute his reality. He grows a fleshy vertical deck on his chest that can be fed tapes that “play” him (that is, brainwash him.) His hand fuses with a pistol that fires “cancer bullets" that make victims explode with new, fast-growing guts (the video of that's maybe too intense for Screened, but check it out here if you're intrigued.) And, along the way, he gets into a steamy relationship with a moralizing radio personality (Debbie Harry of Blondie, would you believe?) who turns out to be a serious freak. Their affair isn't a result of Videodrome, per se, but it nevertheless leads to some of the creepiest sex scenes outside of... well, Crash.
I've spoken before about my preference for Cronenberg’s style of surrealism over David Lynch’s and that preference was established here. Cronenberg keeps all the weirdness married to a tight story and whenever he goes on bizarre or perverse tangent, he always get back on point rather quickly. This movie’s a brisk 87 minutes and, while it leaves you with an ending that’s certainly up for debate, there's still plenty to grasp even if you didn't understand any of the ruminations on media theory and desensitization.
The juxtaposition of meta-fictional psychobabble, creepy eroticism, slow burn paranoia, inventive sci-fi horror and a thick sense of doom is best summed in this clip, the infamous TV make-out scene...If AT&T U-Verse offered those kind of interactive features in the ol' digital cable package, would that make you more or less likely to switch from your current service provider?
It’s hard to believe that this came out in ’83, because it’s commentary on the harmful effects of media seem even more biting in '10. Meta-horror with the theme of “harmful sensation” has become a genre in onto itself and, following that, Videodrome is the patient zero which The Ring, feardotcom and the like have been infected by. Cronenberg admitted to being influenced by the writings of Marshall McLuhan (the mysterious Prof. Brian O’Blivion is a clear analog for the famous media theorist) and, thus, this flick entertains more of the headier implications of your TV eating you than its followers have. Much like when you watch a 4th generation dub, you're startled by how much more depth and clarity is in the original tape.
So there you have it - - the movie behind those intense "Long Live the New Flesh!" samples in industrial music, the second stop on our magical mystery tour that began with The Holy Mountain. Keep your third eyes open and your new flesh firm for the next freaky film we'll be featuring in Welcome to Weird.
