directed by David Cronenberg (1983)
Videodrome is a singularly bizarre film about mess media, body mutation, hallucination, and sadomasochism. Surely not a treat for every movie goer but one of my all time favorites – which is why I was surprised to find I had not recommended it (well, at least not in the pages of Brix Picks) before.
An appropriately sleazy James Woods and a stunning brunette Debbie Harry star in Cronenberg’s finest hour. The movies jumps head first into it’s down the rabbit hole story and rapidly becomes stranger with each scene.
Woods is a programmer for a television channel that focuses on violent and explicit programming and willfully falls into a world of either highly bizarre mind control conspiracy or utter life crippling hallucination after viewing a snuff like pirated program called Videodrome. Along the way he makes out with a television set, buries a gun into his own chest, and meets a cult like leader named Brian Oblivion who only appears on TV on TV.
It’s beyond surreal but grounded in such an imperfect, realistic world of trash strewn hotel rooms, peeling basement studios, and crappy soft core porn, that the fantasy is accepted and it’s ok that the movie tells it’s wild story with a straight face.
If the stills below/after the jump and my highest recommendation don’t peak your interest this appropriately stylish but way off kilter trailer just might.
He will only appear on TV, on TV.
Style to make modern hip girls sob.
Love the off the shoulder cut. BTW, they’re about to have weird sex…
See?
Blondie is quite loveley as a Brunettie.
I say no to the feathers but a big yes to the turban. Such a great, expressive face too.
At the Mission of the Cathode Ray.
Great room, great candles, great curtains.
Chainmail executioner chic.
Oh, Cronenberg.
Lady in Red..
Man in Red – seeing Red.
Open wounds – a Cronenberg classic.
More open wounds and body mutations.
Kill your television,
An intense scene at an eyeglass business symposium.
This is the intense part.
But what do you think?