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The Fly tickets are now available to be purchased or sold online at Stubhub.com. Where does high art and low art meet? You’d best pose that question to David Cronenberg, the famed cult film director whose visions of insect and flesh-inspired horror have influenced movies for decades now. But while he’s made his name in the world of cinema, he’s branching out into an entirely new field. An opera adaptation of Cronenberg’s best known movie, The Fly, will premiere in September 2008 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles. Cronenberg directed the opera, and the music was composed by Howard Shore, who was also responsible for the film’s score (as well as many others he’s collaborated on with Cronenberg). There’s a good chance the opera crowd might not be familiar with the gory special effects Cronenberg’s fan base appreciates. For them, this series of articles will be helpful. Each article briefly examines one of the films from the director’s extensive canon. While most primers on David Cronenberg would include the film Scanners at some point, as that’s the film that really earned him a following, the truth is it’s not a very good movie. The acting is shoddy, the premise never really goes anywhere too interesting, and the only reason anyone knows it at all is because of that shot of a bald man’s head being telepathically exploded. And as singularly rad as that is, it’s really just not enough to warrant more than a paragraph on it. So let’s move on to a much more complex film: Videodrome. With this movie, Cronenberg began to make movies that weren’t just gory, but were mind-trips. Altered reality, a prime theme of William S. Burroughs, begins to show up more prominently. Watching this film, it makes perfect sense that Cronenberg would adapt Naked Lunch to screen almost a decade later. Videodrome is about the addictive power of technology to change thought and perspective—and in doing so, alter reality. The technology in question here is television, which is portrayed as almost a drug that the main character (played by James Woods in an eerily intense performance) is dependent on. This character, Max Renn, is a sleazy TV producer with a taste for black market images. When he discovers a mysterious, illegal pirate broadcast of a show called Videodrome. The program features bizarre and disturbing images, including what appears to be live S&M and possibly snuff films. At this point you should have a good idea whether this is the kind of movie you’d consider renting or not. As Max Renn watches the show more and more often, he begins to hallucinate. His TV set begins to heave and swell like it’s breathing, with thick veins popping out from under the plastic set. In one of its most disturbing scenes, Renn finds a strange gun, and hides it away—in a vaginal pocket that opens in his chest. This film is Cronenberg at his most unsubtle, satirically commenting on technology’s power to overwhelm or humanity. Ultimately, his films seem to suggest, technology is an extension of humanity. But to what degree do we allow it to become an organic extension of us? This extension manifests itself physically in Videodrome, leading Renn to give himself entirely to it, exhorting "Love live the New Flesh!" While the ideas are sound and poignant, the viewers who can stomach Cronenberg’s weird imagery may find he’s beating them over the head with his artistic statements. Sure, the images of mass media are taking over this man’s mind, but do you have to show him having a quasi-sexual experience with his TV set to make your point? It’s a valid criticism, but Cronenberg’s ability to completely transform the world Max Renn lives in is so weird and so compelling that many viewers will discover the appeal that the film’s fans have taken to heart since its 1983 release. Like Burroughs, who’s prose in Naked Lunch blended sci-fi and drugged-out hallucinations into theatrical pastiche, Cronenberg builds a sick and disturbing odyssey for the viewer to traipse through. While it’s not a world most people would like to visit, people looking for something completely different will treasure this flick in their collection. Were it made today, the film would probably be about the Internet rather than television. It’s themes about the dangerous allure of technology and the unchecked dearth of information and images it brings us still ring true today. Written by Andrew Good and sponsored by StubHub.com. StubHub sells sports tickets, concert tickets, theater tickets and more to just about any event in the world. Don't miss this Cronenberg classic with The Fly tickets.
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