Wednesday, October 06, 2004
VIDEODROME
I've been watching James Cronenberg's Videodrome on DVD (because I recently saw Olivier Assayas's Demonlover on DVD (which I also plan to post something on) and looked up some of the reviews, and several said that it was merely a less successful version of the former film). I'm about forty minutes into it so far, and I'm having a hard time getting past the indifferent-to-bad acting and the clanking dialogue. Maybe Cronenberg filmed it like this deliberately, either as a tribute to "classic" horror films or as Verfremdungseffekt (which I don't believe works, by the way). If so, it doesn't work for me. And the first "special effect," with Debbie Harry's lips bulging out of the TV screen and the protagonist whatsizname's head plunging into it, struck me as silly rather than disturbing. I suppose I'll watch some more, though, since it's rented until Saturday. Incidentally, so far this film and Demonlover seem to me to have very little in common, apart from the one obvious and superficial element.
I've been watching James Cronenberg's Videodrome on DVD (because I recently saw Olivier Assayas's Demonlover on DVD (which I also plan to post something on) and looked up some of the reviews, and several said that it was merely a less successful version of the former film). I'm about forty minutes into it so far, and I'm having a hard time getting past the indifferent-to-bad acting and the clanking dialogue. Maybe Cronenberg filmed it like this deliberately, either as a tribute to "classic" horror films or as Verfremdungseffekt (which I don't believe works, by the way). If so, it doesn't work for me. And the first "special effect," with Debbie Harry's lips bulging out of the TV screen and the protagonist whatsizname's head plunging into it, struck me as silly rather than disturbing. I suppose I'll watch some more, though, since it's rented until Saturday. Incidentally, so far this film and Demonlover seem to me to have very little in common, apart from the one obvious and superficial element.
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