Videodrome (1982)

 

Videodrome

David Cronenberg is (in)famous for his disturbing movies and “Videodrome”, his entry onto the Lis, gives us a lot of classic Cronenberg to, well, enjoy.

Max Renn (James Woods) is heading a small television station that specializes in seedy stuff nobody else cares to air. This particularly includes porn and violence and when lab technician Harlan (Peter Dvorsky) picks up a grainy signal from Malaysia depicting very real looking sadomasochistic scenes, Max is sold. He gets Harlan to tape as much as possible and learns it is not from Malaysia at all but from Pittsburgh and is called Videodrome. It is also essentially snuff porn as nobody leaves alive.

Max meets Nicki Brand (Debbie Harry, yes, the one from “Blondie”) and the video presence of a professor called O’Blivion on a  talk show and quickly hooks with her. Turns out she is really into this Videodrome stuff, so she leaves Max to audition for the show.

At this point I was convinced this was a decent into violent pornography, the stuff that makes you want to take a shower after even hearing about it, and Max mission to save Nicki from the clutches of a sinister, underground cabal. In the process, of course, Max will learn the error of his ways.

I was wrong.

The movie takes a strong left turn as Max discovers that the Videodrome signal is used for mind control and the function of the actual pictures is to draw the attention of the viewer. All the sex thing is just a red herring. The mind control makes the viewer hallucinate and often drive the victim crazy. Max is targeted for this mind control and while his world is turned seriously weird (a hole is opening in his stomach, things are coming out of the television etc.), he is turned into a killing machine, to kill the enemies of his controllers. Sort of “The Manchurian Candidate” on acid.

By the time the movie ends, I, the audience, cannot tell what is real and what is hallucinations as it all blends together. This is also the impression I am sitting back with. Accepting the premises of the movie, when I try to follow the narrative, at some point I get lost. Is it dreaming, hallucination, reality or insanity? This confusion keeps the viewer off balance, which is good for suspense, but also threatens to send the viewer into resignation as the narrative cease to make sense. It is a tricky balancing act, and I am not entirely certain Cronenberg manage to keep that balance.

There are smart moves though. The first 15 minutes focus on violent pornography emulates the way Max is drawn into the Videodrome world. Videodrome is not about pornography and neither is the movie, but for both it is the hook.It is supposed to fascinate the dirty mind to want to watch more and thus be subjected to what comes after, the real agenda. It also taps into the idea of mass media as an agent for mind control. This is not new at all, and Hollywood is far from done with that idea, but doing it through the tv screen, targeting particular viewer segments through the choice of the carrier signal is, I think, novel. In 83, home video and easy access to seedy stuff was clearly taking off big time and this strange new world was ready for exploration.

Unfortunately, as for most movies exploring technological novelties, it also makes the movie feel dated. The wonders and magic of the tv signal and video cassettes all look antique by now.

What does not look outdated, though, are all the body horror special effects. Hallucinations or real, the scope and execution of all this weirdness is nothing short of amazing. In an age before CGI, getting these things to look real was really hard and I found them convincing. Others may disagree.

I am not certain where I land with this movie. I understand and appreciate the cleverness of “Videodrome”, but I am not certain I follow it all the way to its conclusion. Rather, I feel I dropped off the wagon somewhere around two-thirds in. In all likelihood, there are a lot of fans out there, but I am not entirely convinced.