David Cronenberg

David Paul Cronenberg (born March 16, 1943 in Toronto, Ontario) is a Canadian film director and occasional actor of Jewish descent. He is one of the principal originators of what is sometimes known as the "body horror" genre, which explores people's fears of bodily transformation and infection. In his films, the psychological is typically intertwined with the physical. In the first half of his career, he explored these themes mostly through horror and science fiction, although his work has long since moved beyond these genres.

Related Topics:
March 16 - 1943 - Toronto - Ontario - Canadian - Film director - Actor - Jewish - Body horror - Infection - Horror - Science fiction

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Cronenberg's father was a journalist and his mother a pianist. He graduated from the University of Toronto with a degree in literature, and has cited William S. Burroughs and Vladimir Nabokov as influences.

Related Topics:
University of Toronto - William S. Burroughs - Vladimir Nabokov

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Over the arc of his career, Cronenberg's 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 (e.g. Shivers, Rabid). In his middle period, the chaos wrought by the scientist is more personal, (e.g. The Brood, Scanners, Videodrome). In the later period, the scientist himself is altered by his hubris (e.g. Cronenberg's remake of The Fly). This trajectory culminates in Dead Ringers - arguably his greatest achievement - in which a twin pair of gynecologists spiral into codependency and drug addiction. Cronenberg's later films tend more to the psychological, often contrasting subjective and objective realities (eXistenZ, M. Butterfly, Spider).

Related Topics:
Shivers - Rabid - The Brood - Scanners - Videodrome - The Fly - Dead Ringers - Gynecologists - Codependency - Drug addiction - EXistenZ - M. Butterfly - Spider

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Cronenberg has said that his films should be seen "from the point of view of the disease", and that, for example, he identifies with the characters in Shivers after they become infected with the anarchic parasites. This perspective is illustrated in The Fly when the hero discovers that he has been genetically fused with an insect. Rather than saying "My teleport machine went wrong", he says "My teleport machine turned into a gene-splicer". Disease and disaster, in Cronenberg's work, are less problems to be overcome than agents of personal transformation. Similarly, in Crash (1996), people who have been injured in car crashes attempt to view their ordeal as "a fertilising rather than a destructive event".

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Aside from The Dead Zone (1983) and The Fly, Cronenberg has not generally worked within the world of big-budget, mainstream Hollywood filmmaking, although he has had occasional near misses. At one stage he was considered by George Lucas as a possible director for ' but was passed. Cronenberg also worked for nearly a year on a version of Total Recall but experienced "creative differences" with producers Dino de Laurentiis and Ronald Shusett. A different version of the film was eventually made by Paul Verhoeven. In the late 1990s Cronenberg was announced as director of a sequel to another Verhoeven film, Basic Instinct, but this also fell through. His most recent work, the thriller A History of Violence (2005), is one of his highest budgeted and most mass audience-accessible to date. He has said that the decision to direct it was influenced by his having had to defer some of his salary on the low-budgeted Spider, but it is one of his most critically acclaimed films to date.

Related Topics:
Hollywood - George Lucas - Total Recall - Dino de Laurentiis - Paul Verhoeven - Basic Instinct

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Cronenberg has also appeared in the films of other directors as an actor. Most of his roles are cameo appearances, as in Into The Night or Alias, but on occasion he has played major roles, as in Nightbreed or Last Night.

Related Topics:
Alias - Nightbreed - Last Night

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In 2002, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Related Topics:
2002 - Order of Canada

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