You might imagine I’d seen this by now, or at least heard of it. Why? Because I extol eXistenZ, another Crononberg film that came out around the same time as The Matrix, and received less notice.
Coming from that background, of having seen eXistenZ more than once, you’ll appreciate how much I found The Videodrome (another “The” movie, like a noir) to be its precursor.
I’m sure critics have already gone to town with the observation, cashed it in so to speak, but to me, a recent initiate, it’s all new. I haven’t read what the critics say nor consulted Perplexity regarding this film. I was blindsided, as they say.
The Criterion Collection 2nd disc (this was from MMU) contains a lengthy (23 min) panel discussion in which Cronenberg and a couple other directors have a moderated panel discussion of the MAA’s movie rating system: G, PG, R, and X. Quite a bit has changed since then.
Cronenberg, from Canada, with even harsher UK-based censorship, was pushing for a rating between PG and R (right?) and since then we’ve seen TV14 appear. Also, X is now MA (Mature Audiences).
The Videodrome is talking about viewer-voyeurism, how the observer is drawn in, in this case Civic TV, a “small station” i.e. literally a “little me everyone” (meaning “Everyman” in the language of Chaucer — in the namespace of learning about Chaucer & Co. in a school setting, I shoulda said).
Everyman can’t take his eyes away from the public hanging or guillotine extravaganza or whatever it is, and this satellite TV show outta Malaysia (not slander, no worries — later Pittsburgh is revealed to be the true source (a spoiler)) is gonna be a likely hit on Civic TV, which specializes in the lurid tabloid stuff that makes money on Time Square (which has done much to clean up its image of late).
I loved the “subterranean lady” character, who still makes old-fashioned X-rated stuff, almost Victorian peep show in its naïveté. Civic TV wants more raw violence, forget the sex stuff. American Psycho might be just around the corner, stealing market share. I’d been on a Christian Bale kick earlier.
Why I liked watching this movie in the sequence I’ve been following, meaning earlier noirs (The Glass Key and The Hidden Room most recently), is partly the sense of continuity I experienced.
The viewer-voyeur (the average tax-paying voter) is being taken by the TV into the smarmy underground of hinted-at perversions and occult rituals, very Epstein. Telegenic televangelists rule somehow, in this newly emergent Donahue-Oprah world, where we get more of a look at everywoman (Everyman is all-genders, partly why he went out of style, for sounding too gender-definitive).
I can hear the lawyers now (figuratively, not “voices” no): ear piercing is the everyday business of cosmetology shops the world over, so trying to sexualize the process in erotic comedy (a serious scene judging by lighting) won’t get us an X, how could it? We’re not showing more than you’d see at an everyday tattoo parlor (sorry, body art shop).
The rules are clear (but they’re not, that’s the whole fun of it if you’re making horror films).
The lawyers are doing a lot of such thinking actually: acted-out violence for real crosses a line that grainy documentary-style violence allows, and considers important for propaganda purposes, the MAA allows it; so keep all the worst violence on television, and have viewers viewing it for context.
And when real blood and guts are involved (another line crossed?), have it all pour directly from a television, like in that Frank Zappa number. Use actual sheep guts (I thought the other guy said pig).
When we get to the ear piercing, we’re talking of-age, consenting adults, obviously, so that part is PG. Teens get their ears pierced all the time.
I’m reminded of Victorian times when, they say, curvaceous pianos needed ankle covers because Everyman was trying to stay focused and didn’t need the piano writhing like some TV console, in sexual ecstasy or whatever it was, especially during a concert with polite company present. Hallucinations might mean brain tumor, as we all know. So cover up those piano ankles already.The “eye of the beholder” is hard to capture, as it’s the one doing the beholding, but this film does a good job. It makes Mr. Civic TV be an alert, intelligent businessman, someone women find attractive. Everyman can identify. He’s like a Neo. The well-worn formulae remain intact and the movie makes money at the box office, as it’s supposed to.
