Movie Notes: “Crimes of the Future” (2022)

Rufus F.

Rufus is a likeable curmudgeon. He has a PhD in History, sang for a decade in a punk band, and recently moved to NYC after nearly two decades in Canada. He wrote the book "The Paris Bureau" from Dio Press (2021).

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14 Responses

  1. InMD says:

    So it’s worth seeing I take it?

    I like Videodrome, Scanners, etc. but I’ve always thought eXistenZ was sort of the unheralded masterpiece where the ideas all mature into a plot that doesn’t rely on the core Cronenberg motifs. The acknowledged classics were just steps along the way to getting there from Rabid, the Brood, etc. I will patiently await being pelted with tomatoes in retribution for that opinion.

    Only semi-related, but speaking of Rabid, a friend of mine still gives me a hard time for insisting on streaming it after way too much to drink one night a few years back. ‘What the hell even was that?’ I assume the esteemed director would be pleased that one of the earlier efforts still elicits that kind of response.Report

    • Rufus F. in reply to InMD says:

      Yeah, it’s definitely worth seeing. I think Neon kinda made a mistake by hyping all the supposed walk-outs (happens every Cannes anyway) because it’s not some shock fest. But Cronenberg’s movies are always more sedate than horrific. Mostly, it feels like a natural progression from the stuff he was writing on his own versus the adaptations. I could easily see it coming after eXistenZ. I’d probably put eXistenZ in the top 10 anyway. I guess my issue was it felt like a reworking of Videodrome- although to be fair, Videodrome feels a little half-finished anyway.

      I will say my girlfriend was less enthused about Crimes of the Future. Her main complaint was many of the plot threads are left dangling, so it feels like it ends too early. I would agree, but he does that a lot. Naked Lunch is pretty much exactly the same way, but you accept it because it’s about drug hallucinations. This one is more like some weird fever dream Cronenberg had- it doesn’t all make sense at first.

      I was surprised (not that much though) that Rabid didn’t come up when Ivan Reitman died. He went from directing Cannibal Girls (and almost getting kicked out of university for producing a hippie sex movie!) to one of the world’s most beloved filmmaker for Ghostbusters. I am glad Cronenberg never tried to go the same way though.Report

      • InMD in reply to Rufus F. says:

        Yea, my similar complaint with Videodrome is the abruptness of the climax. I feel like it’s the kind of thing that makes sense on paper but you put it on film and it comes off like they couldn’t figure out how to end it. Debbie Harry though.

        And that is an amusing point about Reitman I never thought about!

        Anyway I assume I will see this newest one once it hits the streaming services.Report

    • dhex in reply to InMD says:

      back when the “other” crash movie came out, my boss (a very proper new york jewish woman a few decades my senior) popped her head in to recap the weekends and check in on the week. she told me she saw crash over the weekend, in the theater.

      i was surprised, because it’d come out in the mid-90s. maybe she went to a retrospective?

      i had no idea this other film had come out. zero idea.

      so she sits down and says “i have a lot of questions about that movie.” and i am straight up panicking, because like…yeah. car crashes and sexy leg braces! elizabeth taylor! james spader doing creepy stuff!

      none of which is work appropriate! i’m in my mid-twenties and very uninterested in talking about this with my boss, who was an otherwise amazing boss in all respects.

      so she keeps going on and on and finally she says something about matt dillon and i say “wait, do you mean james spader?” and she finally describes the plot. “oh!” i say, flooded with relief.

      “what film did you think i meant?” she asks.

      “oh just some jg ballard adaptation by david cronenberg…it’s very good, but, uh, it has a lot of mature themes.”

      a few years later she ended up seeing it and thanked me for the recommendation.Report

      • InMD in reply to dhex says:

        That is hilarious! And yea, in your position I too would have been wondering ‘how do I navigate this without some kind of outreach from HR?’Report

  2. John Puccio says:

    When I read this graph:

    There are hardly any people in this world, and the ones who are left have been changing their bodies in adaptive ways to a mysteriously threatening environment. We’re told that physical pain has almost entirely vanished and are introduced at the beginning of the film to a child who apparently eats plastic. Yet, we have no idea what could have happened. It’s as if there was a cataclysmic apocalypse that no one finds worth mentioning anymore.

    My immediate thought was Cronenberg meets The Road.

    And then a graph later I see it stars Viggo Mortensen. Of course it does!

    Will definitely check this out.Report

    • Rufus F. in reply to John Puccio says:

      Yeah, there was a story that Viggo was a little reluctant to play the starring role in this one, which struck me as amusing because it really is a classic Viggo Mortensen role. I mean, it’s not like he’s going to be up for a ton of rom coms at this point.Report

      • Saul Degraw in reply to Rufus F. says:

        It is a classic role for him but it also falls into the movie cliche of having the female lead be much, much, younger than the male lead. Viggo Mortensen is 63. Léa Sedoux and Kristen Stewart are in their early 30s. He is old enough to be their fathers. I find that kind of disappointing.Report

  3. Saul Degraw says:

    Eastern Promises is still my favorite Croneberg movie but I’m told this is an outlier take.Report