Review of Videodrome (1983) by Michael W — 22 May 2013

'Videodrome' is a trippy, psychedelic, mind-f**k of a movie.

When a young David Cronenberg teams up with a young Rick Baker on an original screenplay by the director, it makes the grossest scenes from 'The Fly' look tame.

Weird story... told from the point if view of a man (James Woods) losing his grip on reality. Howard Shore is on board, scoring for one of his first feature films. Debbie Harry (of Blondie) tantalizes as a beautiful and naive masochist.

But other than that, this movie is iconically and uniquely sadistic in it's gross-out factor. You can't call Cronenberg unoriginal or timid; he made the movie he wanted to make! Only the infamous Roger Corman compares as a master of shock-schlock deviant entertainment.

That's not to say that 'Videodrome' is without a conscience or a philosophy. There's overt commentary being made here about what the television has done to our generations of people who were raised on it; how it's mutated our very genetic make-up. But in the end, the film is still made by a young boy inside Cronenberg's psyche who loves to see gross things and people's grossed-out reactions. So... Enjoy, you sickos!