Shivers

Starring: Joe Silver, Paul Hampton Director: David Cronenberg Original UK Premiere: 1975 Dvd Release: 6th January, 2003 Number Of Discs: 1 Format: Anamorphic, PAL, Widescreen, Region 2 Encoding

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Shivers is a 1975 film directed by David Cronenberg. An ultra-modern high-rise apartment outside of Montreal is the site of a medical professors laboratory in which he conducts unorthodox experimentations with parasitic organisms. Once implanted, said organisms cause uncontrollable sexual desire in their hosts. The communitys on-site physician & his assistant attempt to stop the spread of the infection before it can overwhelm the population. Shivers   at the Internet Movie Database.

If this picture doesnt make you scream & squirm, you should see a psychiatrist, quick! shouts the films trailer. This time the hyperbole is right. Shivers, David Cronebergs debut feature & Canadas first domestic horror film, is an ingeniously engineered modern horror that, like George Romeros Night of the Living Dead , charts a social breakdown by tearing through our most intrinsic taboos. A genetically engineered designer parasite, part-aphrodisiac, part-venereal disease, created by a modern day mad scientist escapes into a colourless, self-contained apartment complex & goes searching for hosts. This monstrous parasite multiplies & invades the alienated occupants, turning them into a pack of Id-driven sex maniacs. Cronenbergs suffocating vision of modern life turns his budgetary limitations, dreary, bland sets, flat lighting & numb performances, into a severe portrait of society out of touch with its physical & emotional existence. Cronenberg pushed the boundaries of gore in 1974, but more insidious is the way he pushes the boundaries of behaviour: under the influence of this insidious, invasive disease families turn to incest & murder, strangers sexually assault the helpless & finally they band together as a pack of bloodthirsty, libido-driven animals. That taboo-breaking display still has the power to get under your skin. The film has also been released under the titles The Parasite Murders & They Came From Within. Cult horror icon Barbara Steele co-stars.

David Paul Cronenberg is a Canadian horror & science fiction film director. He is famous for creating the genre of body horror, exploring peoples fears of bodily transformation & infection. In his films, the psychological is typically intertwined with the physical. Cronenbergs films follow a definite progression, a movement from the social world to the inner life. In his early films, scientists modify human bodies, which results in social anarchy. In his middle period, the chaos wrought by the scientist is more personal,. In the later period, the scientist himself is altered by his hubris. This trajectory culiminates in Dead Ringers, in which a twin pair of gynecologists spiral into codependency & drug addiction. Cronenbergs later films tend more to the psychological, often contrasting subjective & obective realities. In most projects, Cronenberg tries to represent his motto New Flesh, which explains the mutation of human body or living organism by a machine or any other mutated organism, into the New Flesh. Posters Of Crash

Editors Choice: Spider, Existenz, Crash, Dead Ringers, Naked Lunch, The Dead Zone, Videodrome, Scanners, View DVDology

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