THE CINEMA OF DAVID CRONENBERG

David Cronenberg has moved from the depths of low-budget exploitation horror to become one of North America's most respected movie directors. Since the early 1970s, the softly-spoken Baron of Blood has attracted widespread controversies with a steady stream of shocks – sex-crazed parasites in Shivers (1975), exploding heads in Scanners (1981), revolutionary flesh technology in Videodrome (1983), mutating bugs in The Fly (1986), car crash scars in Crash (1996) and psychopathic bursts of gun fire in A History of Violence (2005). This new study provides an overview of Cronenberg's films in the light of their international reception, placing them firmly in the cultures they influenced. It also highlights often-ignored works, such as the race movie Fast Company (1979), and includes a chapter on the latest film Eastern Promises (2007). Amidst bans and boos, Cronenberg has developed a consistent cult following for his chronicles of humankind's struggle with its ever-changing environment, bugged by technology and changing social roles – becoming a hero of contemporary popular culture.

November 2008
312 pages

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Ernest Mathijs is Director of the Centre for Cinema Studies at the
University of British Columbia. He co-edited The Cult Film Reader
(2008) and is editor of Lord of the Rings: Popular Culture in Global
Context (2006)

'A smart new analysis of Cronenberg's cinema, highly useful for its meticulous summaries, solid and detailed factual accounts of production and exhibition, and the connections drawn between the films and all kinds of contexts - social, critical and industrial.'

– Bill Beard, University of Alberta

'This is a great read - intelligent analyses of the films, good historical and institutional background, and enough information on Cronenberg himself to help it all hang together. A marvellously provocative book on a wickedly smart and provocative director.'
– Joan Hawkins, Indiana University