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For a complete filmography go to the IMDB
Born: March 15, 1943, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
While attending university, Cronenberg made two experimental science fiction shorts, STEREO and CRIMES OF THE FUTURE, before beginning his work in features. 1975 marked his entry into the marketplace with the release of his first commercial feature, the literally stomach-churning shocker THEY CAME FROM WITHIN. Playing on the same theme, RABID cleverly cast Marilyn Chambers, a porn star, as the unfortunate victim of an operation that leaves her with a vampiric appetite for blood. THE BROOD, was a more ambitious exercise in biological horror that revealed the filmmaker reaching for some measure of respectability. A similar sense of directorial assuredness is manifested in SCANNERS, a sci-fi conspiracy thriller involving an underground community of telepaths. VIDEODROME is a nightmare about the effects of TV on its viewers. With THE DEAD ZONE, Cronenberg truly rose above the level of horror exploitation, with one of the better adaptations of a Stephen King novel.
With the big budget remake of THE FLY, Cronenberg hit his stride, finally managing to reach a wide audience without compromising his personal vision. DEAD RINGERS, with Jeremy Irons giving a double performance as twin gynaecologists, is in many ways a distillation of Cronenbergs work. NAKED LUNCH is a brave stab at William Burroughs' unfilmable novel, though it sorely misses the cracking narrative drive of Cronenberg's best work. After the ill-advised venture outside genre territory - an adaptation of the stage play M. BUTTERFLY - Cronenberg returned to more congenial subject matter: CRASH, adapted from the novel by J.G. Ballard, is an amlagam of deviant sex and fast cars - two of the filmmakers favourite subjects. As an actor, he has significant cameos in INTO THE NIGHT and TO DIE FOR and plays the psycho analyst of NIGHTBREED.
- BFI Companion to Horror
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