SHERDOG MOVIE CLUB: Week 221 - Videodrome (1983)

[MusterX]

It has always been an easy path to take to show such content as having a strong influence on people taken to the supernatural extreme of stuff like Mouth of Madness or Demons but I don't think Cronenberg is only doing that here. Videodrome is created by conservative forces who think such content is corrupting and weakening the population but they think nothing of making actual snuff films for their own ends and then depend on a subliminal signal to have an effect on people. You could argue that's as much a comment that moral panics about fiction pale in comparison next to the reality of the evil the establishment is willing and able to carry out.

When you say establishment I assume you are referring to government and corporations mostly, although billionaires are a different kind of control. The Tuskegee experiments, MKULTRA, Operation Northwoods, they don't care about the people. I guess in some ways they care about the people but only enough to keep the people from revolting. They might enact a social security program to make it look like they care but that doesn't override their willingness to do vile things if it means maintaining power or achieving whatever their end goals are for the day are.

Democide is a little know word that means death by government. It has been very effective at killing people around the world over the last century or so.

 

[moreorless87]

When you say establishment I assume you are referring to government and corporations mostly, although billionaires are a different kind of control. The Tuskegee experiments, MKULTRA, Operation Northwoods, they don't care about the people. I guess in some ways they care about the people but only enough to keep the people from revolting. They might enact a social security program to make it look like they care but that doesn't override their willingness to do vile things if it means maintaining power or achieving whatever their end goals are for the day are.

Democide is a little know word that means death by government. It has been very effective at killing people around the world over the last century or so.

Cronenbergs style is obviously quite non specific so I don't think you could link it to any one example but there is I think obviously a healthy dose of anti establishment to the film rather than merely casting the content involved as the source of evil. Coming the same year as The Dead Zone it doesn't really paint a very hopeful picture of the establishment. The opposing forces though do seem quite cryptic, what exactly there aims are and what "the new flesh" entails.

Again I do think Videodrome and Blue Velvet probably stand out as two of the most influential films of the era when it comes to arty strangeness and do arguably stand against the idea that the 80's represented a decline in ambitious cinema. Really what I think you saw was the shift away from mass appeal and the birth of more of an arthouse/cult scene which directors would potentially spend their whole careers rather than "moving up" to larger productions. I spose that environment has existed earlier with people like Roeg but from the mid 80's onwards I think it really came to dominate and today you have people like Jonathan Glazer, Lathimos, Peter Strickland, etc who's spent much of their careers in it.

You could argue I spose that this hasn't always been a positive and that its given rise to a lot of cinema just out for shock appeal, I admit I'm not a big fan of the likes of Lars Von Trier and you could maybe argue that Lychian/Cronenbergish cinema has itself become a bit of a cliché, perhaps even that it plays into society in the US/UK being much more comfortable with sex so long as its used as some kind of marker for madness/abuse/etc.

 

[Yotsuya]

This movie so damn 80’s cool! At times the effects break the spell for few seconds, but otherwise it’s just really durable subversive mindfuckery entertainment.

 

[Yotsuya]

 

[Yotsuya]

View attachment 790107

Spoiler: Hah, I knew this looked somehow familiar!

William Burroughs

 

[Yotsuya]

Cathode Ray Mission (New Flesh) vs. Spectacular Optical (Videodrome)

O'Blivion's organisation is a very interesting one. At surface level it's like highly inclusive merging of spirituality, science and philosophy. In their office we see uplifting works of art from the major religions: gorgeous set of reliefs of Christ, statues of Moses, Shiva and Buddhist guardian lions and a stained glass painting of St. George. The core of their headquarters, the video library room containing their founding father, is just a barren archive. It shows how much the their philosophy is about afterlife, The New Flesh. Brian O'Blivion is both the Moses leading his flock to the promised higher level of existence and the Christ martyred by Videodrome and powers behind it unknowingly playing in the hands of their enemy.

People acting behind the front of Spectacular Optical seem to share the Marxist "opium for the masses" materialism. They want the people to see the world with Spartan clarity so the people could become strong and resolute, so they have created Videodrome to get rid of the degenerate part of the society and maybe as warning for others. Or at least that's the ideology fed for their soldiers like Harlan from whom we hear most of that stuff.

Max Renn is a pawn in this game. Be becomes programmable because of the tumour caused by Videodrome. It's hard to say if in the end he's become an actual initiate for the New Flesh moving on for greater things by getting rid of his physical body or if his usefulness has been just been expired and there's a risk he could be taken over by the Videodrome crew again. Another question is how much of him was recorded by the headset of Spectacular Optical and will he be part of the Videodrome in the future? O'Blivion's side did not have any recordings of him as far as I know, but if he does somehow continue his existence on that side too, we could have a case of Good Cooper vs. Evil Cooper á la Twin Peaks -The Return.

 

[Yotsuya]

That combined with O'Blivion's words on his television interview, something about the excitement of the future vibrations of the cathode ray tube, got me thinking about the weird connection with the real world creation of televisions. As it turns out, the cathode ray tube was invented in an indirect sort of way by a man named William Crookes.
[...]
Perhaps the strangest thing about Crookes is that he was also into the paranormal, so much so that he set up a laboratory for testing mediums and psychics to see if they really could contact some sort of other world. Here is a pic of Crookes with another person who he claimed was actually a ghost named Katie King.

I think this stuff might have ended up on this movie from William Burroughs like some of it's consepts and ideas.

So there is this strange connection to the cathode ray tube and a man named Crookes that was into weird spiritiulism of the time as well as a brilliant scientist. There were other strange things as well, for example, the character Barry Convex is the guy responsible for Videodrome and he is running a cover company called Spectacular Optical.

Another Crookes vs. Spectacular Optics thingie: "The anthropologist Edward Clodd noted that Crookes had poor eyesight, which may have explained his belief in spiritualist phenomena and quoted William Ramsay as saying that Crookes is "so shortsighted that, despite his unquestioned honesty, he cannot be trusted in what he tells you he has seen." Biographer William Hodson Brock wrote that Crookes was "evidently short-sighted, but did not wear spectacles until the 1890s."

Modern Oculus, with same eye logo as Spectacular Optical in Videodrome.

My Oculus Quest has a mode in which the headset uses it's camera to show the user the surroundings, so you see the room in ghostly grey haze! It's really eerie and could be used for all sorts of mindfucks, which naturally brings in mind the headset scene in Videodrome.

 

[moreorless87]

People acting behind the front of Spectacular Optical seem to share the Marxist "opium for the masses" materialism. They want the people to see the world with Spartan clarity so the people could become strong and resolute, so they have created Videodrome to get rid of the degenerate part of the society and maybe as warning for others. Or at least that's the ideology fed for their soldiers like Harlan from whom we hear most of that stuff.

The impression I get was a bit more facist(who also loved exaggerated heroic realism) than communist, both went after art the deemed "subversive" but the way Spectacular Optic look to take over DIrect-TV does to me seem rather more Nazi killing(possible jewish?) owners and taking control plus of course Cronenberg himself is jewish. They also seem to be focused more on nationalist competition rather than class struggle were as Direct-TV is shown to be open and internationalist dealing with foreign producers.

I can actually surprised Cronenberg and Lynch aren't talked about together more than they are, maybe because their viewed as being on opposite side of some art/pulp divide but really by the mid 80's I think they were getting pretty close.

 

[Yotsuya]

The impression I get was a bit more facist(who also loved exaggerated heroic realism) than communist, both went after art the deemed "subversive" but the way Spectacular Optic look to take over DIrect-TV does to me seem rather more Nazi killing(possible jewish?) owners and taking control plus of course Cronenberg himself is jewish. They also seem to be focused more on nationalist competition rather than class struggle were as Direct-TV is shown to be open and internationalist dealing with foreign producers.

I strictly referred to the Marxist scientific materialism, that was a big idealogical selling point way back contrary of conservative religious values, bourgeois decadence and fascist unscientific irrationalism. Naturally the Spectacular Optics crew seemed otherwise very right wing.

 

[moreorless87]

You could argue it is quite different to a lot of sci fi that followed in the next few years(Robocop, Running Man, etc) in that it doesn't feel anti capitalist, Max isn't perhaps shown in the best light but he's obviously more benign than the other forces with his small scale profit motive.

 

[moreorless87]

Not so bad this week but honestly I'v felt the SMC was on the decline for quite awhile not, just seems like most members have their preferences and aren't much interested in moving beyond them which makes for pretty merge discussion.

Thanks to europe for running it for so long but that's it for me I spose...

 

[Bullitt68]

Ok, so if I were to describe this movie I'd say it's like Network with balls. Or a grosser They Live. Cronenberg is one of the few filmmakers ever who can hit you as hard in the brain as he can in the gut, and even though I don't think that this is his best film, I think that it's the best combination brain-gut punch. The themes are inspired and the way that the story unfolds is nothing short of prophetic, yet it's also a classic example of his "body horror" and the way that nothing matters to Cronenberg unless it somehow distorts or contorts or mutates or explodes the human body. I would've preferred a real actress instead of Blondie, and James Woods was oddly subdued considering the filmmaker we're dealing with and considering...well...it's James Woods! But those are minor complaints for what is on the whole a damn good movie that still holds up and is perhaps more relevant now than ever.

I would say that it and Lynch's Blue Velvet were generally considered subversive arty cinema de jour. I spose by that point things hadn't really fundamentally changed, video cassettes and cable/satellite were still the main medium and there was still somewhat of the video nasty scuzzy image(although Blockbuster were starting to take over and force it out) around them. That sense of being subversive having to seek it out of video or watch it on late night channel 4 I think certainly helped with its image.

I don't know that Cronenberg was ever considered "arty" like a Lynch, but you're right about that sense of subversion and the underground feel of a lot of Cronenberg's stuff, especially his early '70s and '80s stuff.

I can actually surprised Cronenberg and Lynch aren't talked about together more than they are, maybe because their viewed as being on opposite side of some art/pulp divide but really by the mid 80's I think they were getting pretty close.

^ That's more my sense of the landscape, with them being separated by viewers' more pretentious leanings toward artsy-fartsy as opposed to pulp/cult. If they're united in any way I would say that it's in a shared fascination with the grotesque and in a penchant for introducing extreme people/events into "ordinary" contexts. But the forms of their films and their storytelling styles are worlds apart, which just makes it harder for people to find those points of connection.

Unlike say The Thing I wouldn't say it has quite the impact it once did in pure strangeness and tension until perhaps the latter stages

Even compared to something like Scanners or The Dead Zone, Videdrome lacks the kind of genuinely gripping, intense suspense and excitement. In that respect, it's a bit dated and kind of lame and cheesy. The Thing most certainly holds up better and blows it off the screen in that respect. Videodrome still holds up because of the themes that Cronenberg was exploring and the wholly unique way that he explored them.

the nature/aims of the subversive side and the "new flesh" are ultimately quite obscure.

This is the major thing that holds the film back from being anything approaching a masterpiece. It's more about its ideas and its vibe than it is about its intellectual sophistication or incisiveness.

I failed at the timing: 20 minutes in diner was ready. Definetly not something to watch while eating if you are kind of impressionable like me. lol.

Ha, yeah Cronenberg's better long after you've eaten and digested. I watched The Fly a few months ago while eating dinner and I'd just taken a giant bite when it got to the "inside out baboon scene"

Some strange things about this film I noticed on my rewatch, I say rewatch because I saw it years ago but went back to remind myself what the film was really all about. I have to say that this viewing was not at all like the first viewing I had around late 80's or early 90's. So on to the strangeness of this film.

The first thing I noticed that was really odd in a script is that the character Brian O'Blivion is running a church cult group called the Mission of the Cathode Ray Tube.

That combined with O'Blivion's words on his television interview, something about the excitement of the future vibrations of the cathode ray tube, got me thinking about the weird connection with the real world creation of televisions. As it turns out, the cathode ray tube was invented in an indirect sort of way by a man named William Crookes.

Crookes was a pretty damn serious scientist. He proved the existence of cathode rays by using a device named a Crookes tube. He discovered the element thallium through the use of spectroscopy.

He invented the Crookes radiometer, also known as a solar engine, which rotates in the presence of electromagnetic radiation.

William Crookes work led to the creation of the cathode ray tube and then later the television. Perhaps the strangest thing about Crookes is that he was also into the paranormal, so much so that he set up a laboratory for testing mediums and psychics to see if they really could contact some sort of other world. Here is a pic of Crookes with another person who he claimed was actually a ghost named Katie King.

So there is this strange connection to the cathode ray tube and a man named Crookes that was into weird spiritiulism of the time as well as a brilliant scientist. There were other strange things as well, for example, the character Barry Convex is the guy responsible for Videodrome and he is running a cover company called Spectacular Optical.

I immediately thought of the Virtual reality known as Oculus Rift.

That pretty much makes Zuckerberg the real life version of Barry Convex. Think I'm lying? What did Maxx, played by James Woods, put on when he met Barry Convex? A VR Headset, in a movie in 1983.

Modern Oculus, with same eye logo as Spectacular Optical in Videodrome.

I mean we even see things like the two dimensional television morph into a more three dimensional image.

Really weird because when I originally viewed the film there was no way of knowing how the world would be dominated by various types of information and media by 2020 and certainly no way to know what VR would look and feel like. Its awesome by the way, I use a Valve Index headset. I mean if one of the messages of Videodrome is that we are headed for a world where reality is warped by media, in Cronenberg's era it was the television, then he did an incredible job with portraying the three dimensional "hallucinations" of what would later be known as virtual reality.

Oh yea, in case you think this post is a rambling mess, I blame Cronenberg, but one last thing. Lets go back to William Crookes for a moment, the guy I said was a brilliant scientist and also a paranormal investigator. He's also the guy that discovered the electron. Let that sink in some. The electron is responsible for all your electronics. I don't know what to make of all this other than to say there is definitely someone on the other end of the script that spent some time thinking about this stuff more than just coming up with a weird film idea.

There is a real world connection between the message of Videodrome and the advent of electronics, which traces back to William Crookes and his Crookes tube experiments.

I miss these posts of yours. The rabbit holes that you find and the stuff that you bring up out of them, it's always a treat to read. The VR/headset stuff is particularly crazy as far as Videodrome is concerned. This was a decade before a childhood favorite of mine, Virtuosity, yet it's far more accurate and prophetic.

Videodrome is a strange film where one might watch it and think what in the hell is this weirdness but deep down its about a warping of what is real and what is not. Its society being altered and changed by media. What has happened in the world in the last 20 years has made Videodrome strangely relevant if you ask me. People watch vile videos that can't be unseen, we engage in some form of media on average most of the day for most people. We have to try to discern what is fake news and what is real news. Now technology is delving into virtual reality and deep fakes that make anyone say or do anything.

My favorite idea in Videodrome is the idea that what you watch fundamentally alters who and what you are. It makes me think of Bill Burr's hilarious joke about how when you see something heinous in real life or on the Internet, it's like your soul is pixelated and when you see heinous shit it's another pixel that floats away. In the context of Burr's joke, the idea is that seeing crazy shit makes you lose something (an aspect of your humanity), whereas in Cronenberg's film, the idea is that you gain something (you become new flesh), but the basic idea - that what we see changes who and what we are - is the same.

 

[moreorless87]

Your trying to spoil my gif send off aren't you?

I don't know that Cronenberg was ever considered "arty" like a Lynch, but you're right about that sense of subversion and the underground feel of a lot of Cronenberg's stuff, especially his early '70s and '80s stuff.

^ That's more my sense of the landscape, with them being separated by viewers' more pretentious leanings toward artsy-fartsy as opposed to pulp/cult. If they're united in any way I would say that it's in a shared fascination with the grotesque and in a penchant for introducing extreme people/events into "ordinary" contexts. But the forms of their films and their storytelling styles are worlds apart, which just makes it harder for people to find those points of connection.

A lot depends on your location, the US film establishment I think struggled much more with the idea of genre cinema having artistic worth, the UK was a bit better and someone like Cronenberg was given more respect(the BBC's non mainstream film showcase name was even called Moviedrome) and indeed a lot of his latter career was supported by British production companies. It Europe even moreso I would say and you really see the divide between the Oscars and Cannes start to play up in the early 80's, something like Isabelle Adjani winning best actresses for Possession would obviously never have happened at the Oscars which had drifted towards rather bland "adult drama" by that point.

As far as Lynch goes I would argue we have had a good deal of favourable re assesment of his career in the US more recently, he may have gotten Oscar attension with The Elephant Man but I think a combination of his career shift and the above meant that after that he was viewed as rather too genre ish to be considered "serious cinema" at the time. Again funding wise he couldn't get money out of Hollywood by the mid 90's and stuff like Lost Highway and Mullholland Drive depended heavily on French production companies.

Even compared to something like Scanners or The Dead Zone, Videdrome lacks the kind of genuinely gripping, intense suspense and excitement. In that respect, it's a bit dated and kind of lame and cheesy. The Thing most certainly holds up better and blows it off the screen in that respect. Videodrome still holds up because of the themes that Cronenberg was exploring and the wholly unique way that he explored them..

The Thing is still primarily an action thriller as well, one with subtext perhaps were as Videodrome is much more an ideas film, not one that looks to give definite answers(on a subject were there arguably aren't any) but at least more heavily focused on making the viewer consider those ideas.

 

[MusterX]

I miss these posts of yours. The rabbit holes that you find and the stuff that you bring up out of them, it's always a treat to read. The VR/headset stuff is particularly crazy as far as Videodrome is concerned. This was a decade before a childhood favorite of mine, Virtuosity, yet it's far more accurate and prophetic.

Well, thanks for that. I connect the dots in crazy ways because sometimes it just makes things a bit more interesting, even if they don't really mean anything. The VR headset stuff in Videodrome is pretty prophetic though, I mean, we are talking 1983 and even weirder is how both the Videodrome logo and the modern Oculus use the eye as their symbol. I just thought it was really weird, especially considering how transformative I think VR is going to end up being. Also, I haven't seen Virtuosity. I did notice its music was by Peter Gabriel, so 90's. Kinda cool how guys like that, also Danny Elfman, get into scores for films.

My favorite idea in Videodrome is the idea that what you watch fundamentally alters who and what you are. It makes me think of Bill Burr's hilarious joke about how when you see something heinous in real life or on the Internet, it's like your soul is pixelated and when you see heinous shit it's another pixel that floats away. In the context of Burr's joke, the idea is that seeing crazy shit makes you lose something (an aspect of your humanity), whereas in Cronenberg's film, the idea is that you gain something (you become new flesh), but the basic idea - that what we see changes who and what we are - is the same.

100%

Videodrome in 1983 is a really weird watch, Videodrome in 2020 is still a weird watch but strangely applies to our times in so many ways. I honestly have much more appreciation for the film now than when I originally watched it, probably late 80's early 90's. Its not just weird for the sake of being weird which is something people mistake with Cronenberg. There is a message in there, it has something to say about the way various types of media are used to change and mold our minds.

 

[Bullitt68]

Your trying to spoil my gif send off aren't you?

I had the posts that I planned on responding to opened in tabs and waiting before you made that post. I didn't even see it, so I had no idea that you were riding off into the sunset. But I'm not going to apologize for pulling you back in like Michael Corleone

A lot depends on your location, the US film establishment I think struggled much more with the idea of genre cinema having artistic worth, the UK was a bit better and someone like Cronenberg was given more respect(the BBC's non mainstream film showcase name was even called Moviedrome) and indeed a lot of his latter career was supported by British production companies.

Good point. The UK also seems to be better about comedy, in the sense that it gets more respect and more credit as artistic achievement.

It Europe even moreso I would say and you really see the divide between the Oscars and Cannes start to play up in the early 80's, something like Isabelle Adjani winning best actresses for Possession would obviously never have happened at the Oscars which had drifted towards rather bland "adult drama" by that point.

Europeans are just out of their fucking minds

As far as Lynch goes I would argue we have had a good deal of favourable re assesment of his career in the US more recently, he may have gotten Oscar attension with The Elephant Man but I think a combination of his career shift and the above meant that after that he was viewed as rather too genre ish to be considered "serious cinema" at the time. Again funding wise he couldn't get money out of Hollywood by the mid 90's and stuff like Lost Highway and Mullholland Drive depended heavily on French production companies.

Lynch is, fittingly, a very strange case. Twin Peaks has considerable cachet, but Cronenberg's weirdness was more genre/mainstream friendly. Scanners, The Dead Zone, Videodrome, they're all weird as shit, but we get sci-fi action, we get sci-fi thriller. The Elephant Man is really the only instance of Lynch hitting that balance of mainstream-friendly weirdness. Eraserhead, Lost Highway, Inland Empire, even Mulholland Drive to an extent, they're just too much for most people. Hence the reaction to Twin Peaks: The Return. Blue Velvet is the only Videodrome-esque film of Lynch's, where his obsessions and his unique style (the latter is what is absent from The Elephant Man, hence my saying that Blue Velvet is the only example) resulted in a genre/mainstream friendly product.

The Thing is still primarily an action thriller as well, one with subtext perhaps were as Videodrome is much more an ideas film

True, The Thing is a straight-up genre piece. Videodrome is nominally science fiction but honestly the only fitting label is Cronenberg's name.

I haven't seen Virtuosity.

Oh, you will love it. On the VR front, it's fascinating. It's very heavy on the "fiction" part of "science fiction," but at the same time it's understandable if not plausible. They've managed to create these VR entities by "uploading" personality types. Russell Crowe is Sid 6.7, the "ultimate boss" of a video game type of police simulator. He is an amalgamation of the worst, most cunning, most despicable aspects of everyone from serial killers to bank robbers. On the other side, there's also Sheila 3.2, the ultimate sex toy/girlfriend experience program. The plot actually gets going when a tech tries to bring Sheila into the real world. The idea that everything goes wrong because a horny geek wants a fuck toy totally tracks

There's also a great bit of social commentary with Sid 6.7 wanting an audience and creating something called "Death TV" which gets ludicrous viewing numbers.

Within a kick ass sci-fi actioner with Denzel Washington hunting Russell Crowe, it's got some fascinating stuff. Oh, and there's a UFC/WWE crossover sequence featuring Ken Shamrock in some sort of weird Battle Royale inside something that's clearly the Octagon

I did notice its music was by Peter Gabriel, so 90's. Kinda cool how guys like that, also Danny Elfman, get into scores for films.

A few fun facts for you here:

1) I'm an obsessive listener of Genesis/Peter Gabriel/Phil Collins, so I know an insane amount of stuff about them. Gabriel always wanted to work in movies - as early as 1974 he was working with William Friedkin on screenplay ideas for a film.

2) My aunt worked for years as an attorney in LA and specifically with lots of Hollywood people. She happened to live for a period of time down the street from Danny Elfman.

3) While visiting my aunt, my dad - she's his sister and also the previous obsessive listener of Genesis/Peter Gabriel/Phil Collins in my bloodline - went to a little shindig at Elfman's house. He told me that Elfman had all of Gabriel's CDs

Its not just weird for the sake of being weird which is something people mistake with Cronenberg. There is a message in there, it has something to say about the way various types of media are used to change and mold our minds.

To keep the Lynch comparison going - if for no other reason to give moreorless more to respond to until he forgets that he wanted to leave - this is more his problem than Cronenberg's. Never, not even in Naked Lunch, did Cronenberg go weird just for the hell of it. Sometimes I think that Lynch crawls too far up his own ass and gets lost. That never happens with Cronenberg. It may not always work, some stuff is better than other stuff, but he's always working to maintain that balance and everything that's weird is meant to serve a purpose that is both interesting thematically and relevant narratively. This is why even if there's stuff of his I don't like I respect everything that he does. Hell, based on his recent less-than-stellar stuff, I wish he'd fucking let loose and tap back into the world of the weird.