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A couple of people at an experimental clinic are daily practicing their mindreading techniques on each other with a bizarre narrator describing all events.

Yep. That's pretty much the best way to sum up David Cronenberg's feature debut. One thing you'll notice at first it's that it's shot in black-and-white, the only one of his films where that's the case (probably so he could afford to make it). The second thing is that there's virtually no sound. You can actually hear a *little* bit of sound if you really turn the volume up, but it's not recommended lest you get the narrator's booming voice blasting at you.
As with most of Cronenberg's work, it's beautifully shot. The superb use of frog perspective, the pans showing the isolated, lonely hall filled with lonely people. The theme of warped psychology would occur in many of his later movies, and is present here as well. The test subjects turn into manic creatures in the name of science, even getting pills so they'll be able to have sex with anyone regardless of their original sexual preference. The story as you can see is erratic, but it nevertheless is intriguing.

The highlights are quite absolutely the people in the experiment going insane, demonstrating man's tendency of deprivating behavior, another Cronenbergian element. And at first, the odd-sounding narrator might be a source of minor amusement.

Despite having a few things going for it however, this is not a flawless movie. The biggest hurdle for many will be the narration, which is so bundled up in technical jargon that it becomes nearly completely impossible to understand at times. If that's supposed to be the joke, it's a little too inside and not quite funny enough. The problem with it as well is that you don't understand the greater purpose of the experiments the scientist (never onscreen) performs on these subjects. Since this is not your usual silent film, which often has music and an easy narrative flow (which this doesn't), you never really get to know the characters, even though you're always following them. You see them laughing and eating, but you have no idea who they really are besides one woman always acting jumpy and another always looking monotone (who gets to narrate a little as well). The change to different narrators is a nice touch, but they all are equally confusing.

I recommend it if you're curious how the master started and want to see the early stages of the themes he would later explore in more eleborate detail. It's interesting enough to stick out with throughout. If you are about to start checking in Cronenberg however, it might be best saved after you've watched some of his more famous work.