Blog Directory CineVerse: A clash of technology and biology

A clash of technology and biology

Thursday, October 25, 2018

Horror films bug some viewers enough to the point where they can't watch them. Others embrace the creepy-crawly aspect of fright films and are willing to let a good scary movie get under their skin--a movie like David Cronenberg's remake of "The Fly" (1986), for example. Our CineVerse science experiment last night was to examine this picture close under a group discussion microscope. Here are our study findings:

WHAT DID YOU FIND UNEXPECTED OR REFRESHINGLY DIFFERENT ABOUT THIS FILM, ESPECIALLY COMPARED TO THE 1958 ORIGINAL?

  • It’s not a pure remake; it doesn’t recycle the same plot or characters. Instead, it employs the same basic teleportation conundrum concept but completely changes the experimental scientist character and his love interest as well as the horrors that they endure. 
  • Here, the focus is on more realistic science, and with more modern concepts like gene splicing. Consider that Brundle doesn’t come out of the teleport machine instantly with a fly’s head. Instead, it’s a gradual transformation that the filmmaker’s attempt to depict plausibly, simulating how real housefly characteristics would take over. 
  • Unlike so many horror films, this one benefits from quality character development and, at its heart, a tragic romance, which gets us more emotionally invested; we care more about these people and their plights, and the sympathetic nature of these situations take on more poignancy. 
    • It helps that Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum were a romantic couple off set at this time; their onscreen chemistry is believable. 
  • Cronenberg has insisted that The Fly is more of a tragic romance than a horror film. 
  • Many critics and fans believe it stands as a cut above several other 1980s remakes of classic sci-fi movies or TV shows from the 1950s, including Invaders From Mars, The Thing, Godzilla 1985, Twilight Zone: The Movie, and Little Shop of Horrors. 
THEMES EXPLORED IN THIS FILM
  • The classic love triangle 
  • Betrayal: not by a loved one or friend, but by your body 
  • Death, disease and mutation—themes prevalent in many Cronenberg pictures. 
    • Many interpreted this film as an allegory for AIDS, which was gaining attention in the media at the time. 
  • The battle between the brain and the body; the mind-body connection and conundrum. Consider how the body relies on the mind and the mind relies on the body, but can fail to function properly without the other. 
    • Deep Focus Review essayist Brian Eggert wrote: “Cronenberg attempts to assess humanity through dissection, in metaphorical terms and otherwise. His mind-body dichotomy literally fleshes-out how anatomy and psychology remain unable to integrate and successfully coexist, and yet remain unwaveringly connected. The Fly offers a horrifying possibility: the body revolting against the mind with the mind unable to assemble any control. Brundle deflowers human arrogance over the flesh, with the mutating Brundlefly an allegory for our own physical woes, awakening us to the body’s often ignored wealth.” 
    • Reviewer Richard Scheib posited the following: “The film seems to echo and mirror Cronenberg’s peculiar Manichean fascinations with the body as a battleground where the will can operate in one direction but the body can frequently rebel or be taken over by other forces – like the images of people being turned into human VCR’s in Videodrome (1983) or psychological repressions forcing themselves into expression in human flesh in The Brood (1979).” 
  • Technology’s effect on the body, the melding of biology and technology. 
  • Science run amok: the hubris of human beings trying to play God or meddle in affairs outside their realm of control. 
  • Metamorphosis—of Brundle, of his relationship with Veronica, of the character of the unsympathetic old boyfriend to suddenly heroic and sympathetic, etc. 
  • Life is fragile and finite. 
FILMS OR STORIES THAT “THE FLY” MAKES US THINK OF:
  • Frankenstein 
  • Kafka’s Metamorphosis 
  • Beauty and the Beast 
  • Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 
  • Eraserhead 
  • Alien and The Thing 
  • An American Werewolf in London 
  • Re-Animator 
  • Hollow Man 
OTHER FILMS BY DAVID CRONENBERG
  • The Brood 
  • Scanners 
  • Videodrome 
  • The Dead Zone 
  • Dead Ringers 
  • Crash 
  • A History of Violence 
  • Eastern Promises

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