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VIDEODROME
(directed by David Cronenberg, 1983)
My mind is still trying to reboot itself after watching Videodrome -- for the first time ever, in fact. I'm not exactly sure where to go with this review. I liked it. Videodrome was weird and surreal and sexy and classic and worthy of attention. See, I had always known of Videodrome, but I never got the chance to watch it. Seeing it listed on On Demand cable, though -- in HD -- I decided to take the adventure.
Videodrome is a massively strange movie about a small TV channel owner in the early 1980's. His name is Max (James Woods) and he specializes in random, out of the blue TV programming that you wouldn't find on regular channels -- he mostly shows softcore porn. So, basically, he runs Cinemax. Well, not really -- actually it's called CIVIC TV. Channel 83. Anyway, Max is looking for something stronger and harder and more intense to run on his TV channel and he comes across a show that's being broadcast in Pittsburgh called "Videodrome". He watches it, he becomes obsessed by it -- it's a show where people basically get murdered, although Max doesn't believe it's real murder.
Deborah Harry from the band, Blondie, has an interesting role in this movie -- Wikipedia describes her as a "sadomasochistic psychiatrist" -- basically, she's sort of the love interest of Max, though this is not a romantic movie, and their love doesn't last long. But she appears, every now and then, in video cassettes, or her lips come smacking out of a television in a weird hallucination that Max experiences. For "Videodrome" has made Max crazy -- reality is not the same anymore for Max. The TV comes to life, his body becomes something else and people around him take on a new meaning as well.
There's a couple of other wacky characters. There's some guy who refuses to show himself except through recordings he makes of himself on video cassettes. There's a bizarre owner of an eyeglasses company that's really a front for the whole "Videodrome" conspiracy. This movie is dated in that everything revolves around VCRs. There's even a VCR-like opening on James Woods' stomach, though it looks more like a vaginal opening, to me. There's blood and guts (literally), there's freakshow bodily transformations -- reminds me of another crazy movie I once saw, Tetsuo: The Iron Man. There's a LOT of television worship, but it doesn't get boring. Thankfully, Videodrome moves and works with ease and strength and never gets tiresome or dull. There's always something new and strange ready to pop up.
I'm not really sure what the exact point of the movie was, but, there is a sense of completion and of duties fulfilled by the time Videodrome is over. It seemed to turn religious on me -- there is a church in this movie devoted to helping derelicts get their television fix, afterall. What fascinated me most of all was the subject matter -- Videodrome deals with the mind, with subliminal programming, there's even talk of Freud and the movie feels like one big playground for the subconscious, or whatever you want to call the areas of your mind that aren't active. The era of videotapes may be over, television may have been replaced with the internet, but the message of this movie -- or, at least, the intent -- is still relevant and still vital and Videodrome does not disappoint almost 30 years after its release. Give it a watch.
(directed by David Cronenberg, 1983)
My mind is still trying to reboot itself after watching Videodrome -- for the first time ever, in fact. I'm not exactly sure where to go with this review. I liked it. Videodrome was weird and surreal and sexy and classic and worthy of attention. See, I had always known of Videodrome, but I never got the chance to watch it. Seeing it listed on On Demand cable, though -- in HD -- I decided to take the adventure.
Videodrome is a massively strange movie about a small TV channel owner in the early 1980's. His name is Max (James Woods) and he specializes in random, out of the blue TV programming that you wouldn't find on regular channels -- he mostly shows softcore porn. So, basically, he runs Cinemax. Well, not really -- actually it's called CIVIC TV. Channel 83. Anyway, Max is looking for something stronger and harder and more intense to run on his TV channel and he comes across a show that's being broadcast in Pittsburgh called "Videodrome". He watches it, he becomes obsessed by it -- it's a show where people basically get murdered, although Max doesn't believe it's real murder.
Deborah Harry from the band, Blondie, has an interesting role in this movie -- Wikipedia describes her as a "sadomasochistic psychiatrist" -- basically, she's sort of the love interest of Max, though this is not a romantic movie, and their love doesn't last long. But she appears, every now and then, in video cassettes, or her lips come smacking out of a television in a weird hallucination that Max experiences. For "Videodrome" has made Max crazy -- reality is not the same anymore for Max. The TV comes to life, his body becomes something else and people around him take on a new meaning as well.
There's a couple of other wacky characters. There's some guy who refuses to show himself except through recordings he makes of himself on video cassettes. There's a bizarre owner of an eyeglasses company that's really a front for the whole "Videodrome" conspiracy. This movie is dated in that everything revolves around VCRs. There's even a VCR-like opening on James Woods' stomach, though it looks more like a vaginal opening, to me. There's blood and guts (literally), there's freakshow bodily transformations -- reminds me of another crazy movie I once saw, Tetsuo: The Iron Man. There's a LOT of television worship, but it doesn't get boring. Thankfully, Videodrome moves and works with ease and strength and never gets tiresome or dull. There's always something new and strange ready to pop up.
I'm not really sure what the exact point of the movie was, but, there is a sense of completion and of duties fulfilled by the time Videodrome is over. It seemed to turn religious on me -- there is a church in this movie devoted to helping derelicts get their television fix, afterall. What fascinated me most of all was the subject matter -- Videodrome deals with the mind, with subliminal programming, there's even talk of Freud and the movie feels like one big playground for the subconscious, or whatever you want to call the areas of your mind that aren't active. The era of videotapes may be over, television may have been replaced with the internet, but the message of this movie -- or, at least, the intent -- is still relevant and still vital and Videodrome does not disappoint almost 30 years after its release. Give it a watch.