NYFF Review #5: A DANGEROUS METHOD

There's a moment in David Cronenberg's A DANGEROUS METHOD in which Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender) and Sigmund Freud (a transformed Viggo Mortensen) are on a steam ship approaching that longtime home of all things neurotic, New York City, where they will unveil their "talking cure," called psychoanalysis, at a prestigious doctor's conference. Freud puffs on his ubiquitously phallic cigar and,

Film #143: Dead Ringers

There was a time, in the 70s and very early 80s, in which David Cronenberg was (at least to me) one of cinema's crassest filmmakers. It wasn't that his films were bad; they were often elegant to look at and were always memorable. But the images I took from them left me with a sour taste: Marilyn Chambers frothing at the mouth in Rabid, the slimy slugs from They Came From Within; the famed

Film #48: The Fly (1986)

David Cronenberg's unique take on the 1958 sci-fi staple The Fly stands as one of the few remakes that actually improves upon its predecessor, chiefly because of its superb lead performances and the infusion of Cronenberg's singular, biology-obsessed worldview into the story. Jeff Goldblum expertly portrays eccentric scientist Seth Brundle, whose invention of "telepods" goes horribly awry when he