Don’t count David Cronenberg Among the author who wears the torch for theater exhibition. Talk to Jim Jarmusch for Interview magazineThe Body Horror Legend Explained that he does not see common film as a naturally superior way of watching his films.
“I only see movies in real theaters every now and then, mostly on film Festivals, and I have found that the projection is not always so great, “Cronenberg said.” I remember I was in Venice on stage with Spike Lee and some others. He talked about the cathedral in film, the whole religious aspect of it. And I said, “Spike, I’m looking at” Lawrence of Arabia “on my watch, and there are a thousand camels there. I can see each of them. ‘I joking, but what I meant was that I don’t think the cinema experience is so good. Maybe it is because I’m older. I don’t feel the common thing.”
Cronenberg’s thoughts on technological developments in filmmaking and display are in line with much of his filmography, which is often about the need to embrace changes or risk remaining by nature. He expressed similar thoughts about Celluloid filmTo say that the convenience of working with digital cameras outweighs all the visual benefits that can come from shooting on film
“I think people who talk about streaming can be very passionate in the way we were passionate in the cinema after we saw a movie. So it’s different, but I don’t think it’s worse,” he said. “I also don’t miss working with film. The cutting and editing was a nightmare for me. It was very restrictive. You have so much more control now. And of course we are control freaks to some extent if you make a movie.”
Cronenberg’s latest film, “Hyls“Now playing in theaters. The film, which follows a widow that processes its grief by placing its wife’s body in a live-streaming coffin, was noticed a critic choice By IndieWires David Ehrlich after his premiere at the Film Festival 2024.
“Inspired by the loss of the director’s wife, ‘The Shrouds’ is a history of mourning because only David Cronenberg would ever think to shoot one,” read IndieWire’s review. “Sardonic, unsentimental and often so cadaver stiff that the film itself seems to suffer from Rigor Mortis, as if its pictures died sometime along their short journey from the projector to the screen. And really, what would you expect?”
