Dead Ringers (1988)

Profound examination of lost sanity, the decline of brilliance unto madness.

Like many other known masters of horror like Tobe Hooper or George Romero, David Cronemberg is one of the most renowned and prominent directors working today in the industry. Only few talented filmakers sprang into public consciousness with such audacity and intelligence, from a series of low budget surprising shockers back in the mid 70's , untill today's acclaimed classic masterpieces of all times in modern horror, with the unmistakable mark of a true author, a gifted brilliant talent that explored with authentic passion, the limits and boundaries of hallucination, grotesque, and surrealistic carnal madness.

The difference between Cronemberg and other repected colleagues worth mention, is that he never got caged in the same level of scanning of the genre, he's a dark pioneer, a visionary of the physical and emotional human alterations, showed in both style and aesthetics so gruesome and disturbing, they became the language, the vocabulary of his frosty architecture of fear. He evolved, refusing to stick to a safe formula, exploring with anxiety his great concern throught his always tormented characters: The profound examination of the mind and the descent of the human psyche unto lunacy, along with the dissection and mutation of the flesh, with all the pain, anger and frustration implied, inflicted upon a human soul.

In this horrific drama, Jeremy Irons, i a career performance, plays two twin brothers, Beverly and Elliot Mantle, renowned gynecologist who operate in an exclusive clinic and share a great reputation of brilliant innovators in the field. They also share more intimate aspects like sexual complicity, as the more confident Elliot seduces women and then allows his more shy and introvert brother Beverly to reap the benefits. It all goes down when Beverly falls in love with careless drug addict actress Claire Niveau (Genevieve Bujold), a new patient with a bizarre gynecological deformity, fascinating the unprevented twin and inducing him to a dangerous addiction to drugs and alcohol along with the separation from Elliot. However, Elliot senses his brother's decline to paranoia and tries to save him, only to fall victim of the same urges. What continues can be described as a surrealist downward spiral of eccentric, raw, and painfuly insane circumstances and consequences, surrounded by a creepy cold atmosphere.

Unlike his previous masterpieces like the astonishing "The Fly", the classic mind-bending visual shocker "Videodrome", or even his first major effort that catapulted him to a cult-following status "Scanners", all outstanding and incredible classics, this movie was the true Cronemberg consecration in his filmaking carrer, he was consolidated as a director, master filmaker and unique author, cementing his path in the industry as an amazing and original creator. All those strong achievements, without the abuse of the trademark gore imagery that shocked audiences worlwide and defined his atrocious and raw portraits of macabre. Not leaving the usual mind-flesh connection still in its glory, with this critically aclaimed masterpiece "Dead Ringers", David Cronemberg proved his value as an artist, leaving the forbidden pleasures and desecrations of the flesh aside, with a new devotion for the obscure corners of the human mind, a real descent to insanity, and the best proof ever filmed that the grisly and sinister special effects were only serving a higher purpose, all the way in his prolific career.

The master of horror-surrealism dominated the sugestion as a form of mind-disturbance, in this almost isolated experience in his filmography, before he retaked the gore and shocking visuals imagery in the diurnal nightmare known as "The Naked Lunch". However, this masterpiece remains as a true portrayal of collapse in a frighteningly believable fashion, and obscure drama about obsession and emotional defects in a disquieting clinical tone, with all the bizarre qualities that turned Cronemberg in a master filmaker, side to side with David Lynch in the description of disturbing, deformed, atmospheric and uncomfortable worlds within human behaviour.

June 17, 2008

Smart horror for the thinking person to obsess upon

This is one of the most disturbing films I have seen and I recently watched it again after 10 years and found it is just as disturbing now as 10 years ago.

The story is very hard to describe because much of the action is actually mental deterioration of Beverly and Elliot Mantle, twin gynecologists. These men are brilliant and whereas one conducts the clinical research and writes the journal publications, the other markets their work and is the public face of their accomplishments. Beverly sees patients and conducts surgery while Elliot deals with hospital and departmental power struggles. Beverly is more studious, withdrawn, shy; while Elliot is more daring, verbal, outgoing, and assertive. They have developed a pattern whereby Elliot will seduce women and as he tires of her he will hand her off to Beverly who steps in and acts like Elliot.

This pattern breaks down when Beverly diagnoses a famous actress, Claire Niveau, played by Genevieve Bujold, as having three cervixes and as infertile. Elliot beds here first and then Beverly but as a master of emotion and acting, she quickly figures out the scam once she learns they are twins. Claire starts Beverly on a downward projection in that he becomes emotionally attached to her and this creates a distance between he and Elliot. She is also a drug addict and he begins taking all the uppers, downers, all-arounders that she doles out to him until he takes the lead and puts her to shame with the amount of drugs he eats.

As Beverly deteriorates, Elliot tries to keep him sane. Yet as Beverly sobers up, Elliot oddly enough becomes completely out of control and addicted, as if Beverly was actually passing off his addiction to Elliot. As these two personalities dissolve into schizophrenia, addiction, and eventually suicide and murder, the viewer better hold on for a wild ride. Beverly becomes totally out of control during surgery and during gynecological examinations in some frightful scenes. A classic scene is where he has tied off his arm and injected heroin sitting at his office desk and his secretary comes in and calmly resigns saying that she can't take the chaos any more while Beverly is too intoxicated to care.

Jeremy Irons displays absolutely a phenomenal job of acting in this film. This is an outstanding performance, worthy of high praise. He must not only play two characters but also play those same characters as they fall apart and deteriorate. Genevieve Bujold is also superb and convincing.

Many sub-themes bubble about in this film, including exploring the similarity between emotional and chemical dependency. Creepy but challenging, unnerving yet thoughtful, this is a thinking person's horror show.
May 25, 2008

Survival by death

Cronenberg is the most surprising and shocking film director I know but he always deals with situations that are out of the ordinary and he pushes them to their extreme end or even beyond. In this film he explores the relation between two real twins who have perfectly identical routes in life to the point of becoming schizophrenic and wanting to get rid of the second half of their individual personality, which is the personality of the other. They become obsessed with separating the Siamese twins they are in a way and yet are not. This derangement develops all by itself and they discover that they cannot survive separately and as soon as one does something that the other does not do both of them are disturbed to the point of having to become morbid, death-obsessed, death-seeking, death-hungry and death-thirsty. Death becomes what they physiologically need, each one of them, and both of them, to survive by compensating the difference that has appeared in their relation. All that sounds crazy and is in fact just extremely natural, natural to the extreme. The death instinct, the other side of the libido, takes over when the slightest difference appears between them and is interpreted, unconsciously, subconsciously and even consciously, as a treason of their libido, or libidos, of their libidinous survival instinct. Their survival instinct calls their death instinct up to regulate the disruption and what has to happen happens: one kills the agreeing other and that one let himself die on the body of the one he has killed, the one who has died first. The supreme irony of that film is that these two identical twins are gynecologists by profession and they are giving birth to babies day after day, till they finally and mutually abort their own lives. Amazing. And what's worst in this picture is that it is realistically possible. Cronenberg here reveals the deep fear we feel in front of identical twins, a real vertigo, in Hitchcock's meaning of the word.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines
March 16, 2008

The WORST movie I've ever seen.

This has got to be the WORST MOVIE that I've ever seen. Unless you REALLY go for semi-erotic thrillers, skip this unless you really want to see how NOT to make a movie. Had Jeremy Irons skipped this movie, he probably would have become one of the leading actors of the early 90s. I remember going to see this movie simply because it seemed like his career was on the upswing and some friends I ran into recommended we go see it instead of the cheesy comedy we were going to see. What a waste. Some people on internet boards seem to like it, but most everyone I've ever talked to face to face that has seen this has hated it. This is one of those times I wish Amazon had a negative star rating system. AVOID AVOID AVOID. December 29, 2007

what a waste!

This movie begins with the interesting idea of psychological Siamese twins but quickly descends to a trashy story of sexual deviation and drug addiction. What a waste of talent all around! For a different kind of movie about Siamese twins, I recommend "Twin Falls, Idaho." Better still, why doesn't someone film the story of Chang and Eng Bunker, the original Siamese twins? November 13, 2007

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