Videodrome (6/10)

 

    "Videodrome" is a Canadian science fiction horror film from 1983. James Woods plays the main character, Max Renn, who is a CEO of a television broadcasting company that specializes in sensationalist programs - stuff that isn't respectable and classy, stuff that is meant to get a reaction even if it's outrage. He picks up a weird broadcasting signal from Pittsburgh containing what ends up being called "Videodrome." It's a program without any plot or point, just lots of sex and violence. 

      This one caught my attention simply because it was in the "Body Horror" category on the Peacock streaming service. It was directed by David Cronenberg who also directed "The Fly" with Jeff Goldblum, so I took that as a good sign seeing as "The Fly" is an excellent horror film with practical effects that still hold up to this day. 

    The gore and body horror were super cool and grotesque and the performances of the actors were excellent. I also loved how the VHS tapes and television sets would pulsate in a way that was both erotic and hideous. The practical effects were fantastic and the whole concept was solid on the surface but - I feel like I maybe just didn't get it?

    It had like, two or three concepts going at once even though I felt like it only needed one. Therefore, it was rather confusing as far as it's purpose and point. It's still an entertaining watch, certainly, but it didn't resonate with me like other films have. Perhaps it went right over my head.

    Gonna get a little more specific so

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SPOILERS

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And Trigger Warnings: Violence, Blood and Gore, Torture, Sexual acts, Suicide, and Substance Abuse

    So, they find this horrible TV show that is just brutal sex and violence, nothing else. Max Renn seems to hold the viewpoint that having all of this perverse and disturbing media is actually HELPFUL, because he thinks it kind of acts as a harmless buffer for humanity's violent urges and unacceptable desires. 

    "Better on the screen than on the streets." 

    The film could have just focused onto that idea, that taking in way too much violent and abusive material has a negative effect on the viewer. How what we WATCH can change us somehow and change society as a whole. Max starts to experience these crazy hallucinations filled with him being violent to other people and he keeps seeing horrible, erotic movement in objects that are supposed to be inanimate. His whole "reality" is becoming overtly violent and sexual. 

    The body horror aspects were sort of unexpected, honestly. For some reason, Max develops this large fleshy slit in the middle of his abdomen?? And he is able to stick his hand inside of it and also put a gun inside of it and carry it around?? And when he takes his hand or his gun out of the slit, everything is all gooey and gross? I don't know if the slit is real or not. I don't know if the gun is real or not. It kept jumping between the gun being fused to his hand with bloody, boring wires and his hand being perfectly normal so it's not clear what's going on exactly. And maybe that's the point? 

    The character Professor Brian O'Blivion had a nice collection of really cool quotes and ideas. I think this one sums up most of the controversial viewpoint that makes up the majority of the film's commentary:

"The battle for the mind of North America will be fought in the video arena: the Videodrome. The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye. Therefore, the television screen is part of the physical structure of the brain. Therefore, whatever appears on the television screen emerges as raw experience for those who watch it. Therefore, television is reality, and reality is less than television."

    

    Obviously a very dangerous line of thought. How the media we watch can influence how we perceive reality and how we can lose interest in reality all together because television is so much "better." More colorful, more beautiful, more violent, more spectacular. There are already issues with those who are addicted to pornography today - they can be unable to enjoy a perfectly normal and healthy sexual encounter with another person because the simulated sex they have viewed so often has been unrealistic and staged. And then, when that level of sexual material doesn't scratch the "itch" anymore, the addicts need to find even more extreme content to get the same satisfaction as before.

    Apparently addiction is a solid theme of the film as a whole. That seems to be a consensus from some of the other reviews and summaries that I've read while I was gathering my thoughts. And that totally makes sense because there are literal homeless shelters where people come in to watch TV in their own little cubicles. Not to get a bowl of hot soup or a place to sleep safely - to watch TV. As if it's something you just need a hit of to make it through the day. As if you can't live without it. 

    And then it's revealed that the Videodrome channel is real. It's not actors doing scripted scenes of pornographic torture. It's real. It's snuff television with people honest-to-goodness being killed at the end of each episode. 

    All of the above made sense to me. I figured the body horror involving the gun fusing to Max's hand was sort of symbolic? To represent him being unable to escape physically transforming into a violent being because of the violence he consumed depicted on the television. Whether he could have put the gun down any time or just THOUGHT that he couldn't, the result is basically the same. Television was becoming his reality. 

    That all tracks. The parts that drew me in different directions involved the whole "Videodrome show gives you a malignant tumor in your brain when you watch it" and "this evil Corporation is using Videodrome's mind-control to eliminate its competitors and violent people overall." 

    The whole idea of media vs. reality and the effects of violent and sexually perverse television was interesting enough on its own, especially considering we're still having this conversation 40 years later. But the TV station gathering more and more people to its "cause" through brainwashing and mind control to do this whole secret agenda in the background -- It just didn't make sense to me. 

    They make Max kill his studio colleagues with his gun-hand and then head out after the daughter of Professor Brian O'Blivion because she knows the truth of Videodrome with all of her father's videos and research. She snaps him out of it and "reprograms" Max to go after the Videodrome broadcasting company instead. And he shoots the guy running the broadcasting station and says "Death to Videodrome! Long live the new flesh!"

    Then he runs away to a derelict ship in a junk yard to hide from the police and the TV turns itself on and tells him "You've hurt Videodrome but in order to defeat it completely, you need to leave the old flesh and ascend into the new flesh!" And he listens and shoots himself in the head. Credits roll. 

    Did - did he actually ascend above Videodrome and their reign of corruption and terror? Did he really defeat them in the end? Or was his death some sort of trick to be like, "you thought you were above all this but we had your mind in our hands all along. Go ahead, free yourself, you stupid bastard." And that's one less person that can get in the way of Videodrome's goals. 

    Which, by the way, are... what? To - give everyone brain tumors and turn them violent and promiscuous?? Is the end goal supposed to be the corruption and conquest of humanity?? Are the old flesh and the new flesh actual things or was that brain-washy bullshit they sold to Max to further manipulate him? 

    There's so much interesting material here but it seems like everything after "television vs. reality and the effects of violence in media" went over my head and ended up just feeling like unnecessary clutter.

    I don't understand how Videodrome was like, a front for a secret arms company that wanted to kill members of the company Max worked for. 

    The Wiki says they wanted to "end the cultural decay of North America by killing off everyone obsessed with sex and violence." So... Videodrome acted as a metaphorical fishing net to clean up the proverbial river of the American people? Anyone who would watch the horrible content on Videodrome to begin with deserved to be removed from society permanently with an unexplained brain tumor?? If the broadcasting company was really trying to create a better world, the film didn't really emphasize any sense of nobility or well-meaning in their methods. The CEO of Videodrome wasn't really given enough screentime to really pitch his desires in a way that really made his cause seem just and sincere.  

    Max's gun-hand kept disappearing and reappearing between shots that were mere seconds apart, so the film was obviously working with the idea that it might've been a hallucination all along. Could he have put the gun down at any time or was it really fused to his flesh? Was it just the gun-hand or was damn near everything a hallucination after he let Videodrome in for the first time? The enemy CEO shoved a VHS tape into Max's stomach through the gross flesh slit, was that not real either?? 

    I was just kind of lost and confused at the end. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to feel sad that Max "failed" and succumbed to violent pressures or to feel relieved that he "escaped." Apparently there were three different endings to the film so the final few scenes were... a bit of a topic of debate for everybody, I guess.

    So yeah, that's basically my review. James Woods' character Max was awesome, Professor Brian O'Blivion was awesome, the practical effects were awesome. The plot was just too weird and I had trouble following the whole second half of the film, but that could totally be on me and only me.

    

Thanks for reading!

More reviews to come