If this all sounds ridiculous, it’s possible Cronenberg would agree. Despite a pervasive atmosphere of environmental collapse and societal breakdown, the film has a cheeky sense of its own absurdity. It’s outright funny at points, especially when the sublimely pervy Timlin is on screen.
Cronenberg has always been something of a covert surrealist, but the science-fictional justifications for his images, ideas and sensations have never felt quite so tenuous or incidental as they are here. Long-time admirers may find this shift frustrating, but there’s an undeniable singularity of vision – one that makes previous works seem diluted in comparison.
Crimes of the Future certainly isn’t Cronenberg for Beginners. It feels akin to David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The Return (2017): both a career-spanning roundup of recurrent tics and fetishes; both the work of an elder statesman content in only referring to himself. But, as with The Return, this isn’t a straightforwardly backward-looking work. Cronenberg has expressed a certain distaste for the term ‘body horror’, and he’s always seemed conflicted about the radical shifts in human biology he presents.
While the strictures of genre have historically led him to err on the side of pessimism, Crimes of the Future leaves us on an optimistic note (albeit a cautious one). Here we find the “Baron of Blood” making a concerted effort to liberate his
anarchic bodies from their prior horror context. Consequently, Cronenberg’s latest feels more like a late-in-the-day course correction than a victory lap. It’s a self reflexive film, yes, but it isn’t self-congratulatory.
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