UNIVERSITÉ SAINT-JOSEPH DE BEYROUTH

INSTITUT D’ÉTUDES SCÉNIQUES, AUDIOVISUELLES ET

CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUES

Graduation Thesis
Bachelors in Performing Arts (Audiovisual)

Body Horror and Kafkaesque Influence

Introduction to the concept of metamorphosis according to David Cronenberg

Nasma Younes

Under the supervision of Mr. Toufic El - Khoury

Beirut
January 2021

This memoire has been translated from french by Nasma Younes on the 25th of March 2021.


Page 1! of 38
!
 Contents

Introduction …………………………………………………………………. p. 3

Chapter I. The Kafka Impact ………………………………………………… p. 8

1. The Fly, a loose adaptation of the literary work? …………………… p. 8
2. The Kafkaesque influence in the rest of Cronenberg's films …….… p. 15

Chapter II. Dehumanization of the human body ……………………………..… p. 18

1. Rabid (1977) …………………………………….………….………… p. 18
2. The Brood (1979) ……………….…………………………………….. p. 21
3. The Fly (1986) …………..…………………………………………….. p. 23

Chapter III. The humanization of the non-living …………………………….…… p. 27

1. “Mediamorphosis” ……………………………………………………… p. 28
A. Videodrome (1983) …………………………………..………… p. 28
B. Existenz (1999) …………………………………………………. p. 32
2. The concept of 'Man-chine' ………………………………………………. p. 36
A. Crash (1996) …………………………...…………………………. p. 37
B. The Fly (1986) ……………………….…………………………… p. 39

Conclusion ……………………………………..……………………………………. p. 40

Page 2! of 38
!
 Introduction

Although the horror genre is known to depict the supernatural, strange and
unknown, in reality it has always represented the societal fears of the era in which it
occurs. Whether in cinema or in literature, whatever the collective fear of our society is at
any given time, the horror genre has often represented this fear through a disruptive
element that interrupts the peaceful universe of the film narrative. In most of these horror
movies, that disruptive element takes the form of a monstrous creature, but that isn't
always the case. In the horror sub-genre of Body Horror, the monstrous element manifests
itself as an inner transformation or a body mutation that begins with one of the characters
in the film, instead of an exterior threat. Ronald Allan Lopez Cruz defines body horror as
"a sub-genre of horror that intentionally exhibits graphic or psychologically disturbing
violations of the human body" 1.
Body horror first appeared in literature in the early 19th century, with Mary
Shelley's epistolary novel Frankenstein (1818), but gained popularity from the mid-1970s
with Shivers (1975), a film by Canadian director, David Cronenberg. Written and directed
by David Cronenberg, Shivers is the very first film that explores the dangers of
experimental surgery by showing how parasite experimentation from an organ transplant
leads to a rapidly spreading virus that transforms normal people into aggressively sexual
beings. Despite the film's poor reception, soon after Shivers, David Cronenberg decides to
write and direct another very similar film, but this time it will be well received and will
jumpstart David Cronenberg's career, making him one of the main creators of Body
Horror. That movie is Rabid (1977). Shivers and Rabid explore the same theme of the
danger of experimental surgery, but in Rabid, David Cronenberg pushes the boundaries of
body horror further than in Shivers, by exaggerating the bodily mutation and the spread of
the disease on a larger scale. It becomes a common theme in the director's filmography.
Shortly thereafter, Cronenberg directed his third and then fourth film The Brood in 1979
and Scanners in 1981, which also dealt with similar themes. Both explore the power of
the human brain and the danger of modern psychology and neuroscience. While, these

1LOPEZ CRUZ, Ronald Allan. Mutations and Metamorphoses: Body Horror is Biological
Horror. Journal of Popular Film and Television , print.-December 2012, n° 9-10, p. 161,

Page 3! of 38
!
two films are well received by audiences, it was his fifth film that really gave him his
fame in the film industry, especially as a director of body horror, and this film is
Videodrome, which he directed in 1983, just two years after The Brood. Although
Videodrome is set in a scientific context and deals with the dangers of modern science, it
is unlike anything Cronenberg had done before. This film, which depicts the horrors of
media in the field of brainwashing and its impact on the humans false perception of
reality, was very well received by audiences, even being called "the perfect example of
body horror" by Adam Smith from Empire magazine 2. This film has since become a cult
film, but, it is not the director's most popular film. In 1986, he wrote and directed the film
which is now known to be his most beloved, and also commercially successful film, The
Fly, starring American actor Jeff GoldBlum. This film is a free adaptation of George
Langlaan's short story The Fly, published in 1957, but is largely equated with Franz
Kafka's book The Metamorphosis (1915), since the two have many similarities.
According to William Beard, “we briefly notice the film's resemblance to Kafka's most
famous short story, The Metamorphosis, especially when Kafka is part of the small
collection of modernist writers whose names Cronenberg repeatedly mentions” 3 . The Fly,
like one of David Cronenberg's previous films, Rabid, introduces us to the world of
insects, something he then did on a larger scale in 1991 in his film Naked Lunch. In 1996,
Cronenberg wrote and directed Crash, his most daring film to date. With a plot that
revolves around unusual fetishes, this film generated a great deal of controversy upon its
release and drew widely divergent reactions from critics, but this controversy was quickly
resolved in 1999 when he wrote and directed one of his most critically acclaimed films,
Existenz. In its form, Existenz has been successful because it looks like Videodrome, both
explore very similar themes of questioning reality and both highlight the danger of
modern media.
David Cronenberg's films, while all of them are unique in their own way, all share
some apparent and non-apparent similarities, both in substance and in form. The most
apparent similarity and what one might call a common thread throughout all of his films

2 SMITH, Adam, “ Videodrome”, Empire, 14 Oct 2015, (consulté le 20 octobre).

3BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. University of
Toronto Press. Toronto : William Beard, 2006, p. 217

Page 4! of 38
!
is the way he portrays the human body in an experimental way, in order to convey a
commentary on the negative impact that scientific experimentation and media
manipulation have on our society, and how it affects our behavior. This common thread is
present throughout the filmography that I have just defined, which indicates that this
theme is a source of creative inspiration for the director. Moreover, the filmography that I
have just defined can be divided into two categories. The first group of films belongs to
the category of films in which David Cronenberg dehumanizes the main characters and
reduces them to their animal or insect nature by subjecting them to a process of bodily
transformation or mutation after a certain experimentation, which can lead to the
breakdown of their body or the spread of viral disease. This first category of films is there
to convey a commentary on the dangers of modern science and the power they have over
people. While the second group belongs to the category of films in which David
Cronenberg humanizes the non-living by giving objects human-like traits and
transforming them into living organisms or giving them an incomprehensible sexual
attraction that pushes the protagonists to act inconsistently. This second category of films
is there to comment on the impact that the modern media and technological products of
our society have on the population in terms of questioning our identity and the difference
between what’s real and what’s illusory. In these categories, one movie stands out by
belonging to both, and that movie is The Fly (1986). As previously stated, The Fly is one
of Cronenberg's many films that introduces us to the world of insects, which is why it is
always equated with the novel The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, a novel centered on
the story of a young salesman, Gregor Samsa, who wakes up one day from work to find
himself inexplicably transformed into a huge insect and unable to adapt to his new
situation. While the resemblance between The Metamorphosis and The Fly is obvious,
many other Cronenberg films also appear to have similarities to this literary work,
indicating that this novel could be a possible creative inspiration for the director's
filmography.
That being said, the following questions arise here: While referencing the literary
work of Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis (1915), can we qualify the horror films of
Canadian director David Cronenberg as Kafkaesques? How does the director highlight the
direct impact of modern scientific experimentation and manipulation of media images on

Page 5! of 38
!
the individual? Applying the same tale of body transformation present in the novel, how
does David Cronenberg portray the dehumanization of the living and the humanization of
the non-living, in his body horror films?
In order to answer these questions, I propose the following plan: In a first part,
relying solely on The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, I will determine the similarities
between the novel and a list of David Cronenberg films, focusing mainly on The Fly, in
order to clarify the obvious inspiration that the director drew from this literary work for
his films, in substance and in form. In a second part, I will cite and analyze the
similarities of the films that fall under the category of the dehumanization of the living in
order to further clarify David Cronenberg's commentary on the dangers of modern
scientific evolution, by analyzing three films that represent three different scientific
fields, teleportation, surgery and advanced psychology. Finally, in a third and final part, I
will cite and analyze the similarities of the films that fall under the category of the
humanization of the non-living, in order to further clarify the director's commentary on
the power that the media and scientific progress have on humans, and how this affects
their behavior based on these factors.

Page 6! of 38
!
Chapter I. The Kafka Impact

1. The Fly, a free adaptation of the literary work?

In the novel of the 20th century Czechoslovakian writer Franz Kafka, The
Metamorphosis, published in 1915, the protagonist, Gregor Samsa “wakes up one
morning after coming out of restless dreams” 4 and finds himself inexplicably
transformed into a massive insect. Much like in The Fly (1986), David Cronenberg's film,
during his metamorphosis, the protagonist, Seth Brundle had finally realized that he was
"an insect who had dreamed that he was a man and loved it, but now the dream is over
and the insect is awake ”. A subtle but somber reference to the fable of Chinese thinker
Chuang-tzu, The Dream of The Butterfly, in which Chuang-tzu dreamed of being a
butterfly but when he woke up he wondered if it is not rather a butterfly who dreams that
he is Chuang-tzu5.
However, waking up from restless dreams is only one of the similarities shared by
Gregor Samsa and Seth Brundle. In this first part, I will cite and analyze the rest of the
similarities between the literary work and the film, starting from the most general to the
most detailed.
Essentially, both works represent the same tale of a man transforming into an
insect. In the film, the protagonist, Seth Brundle, an eccentric scientist, mistakenly
transforms into "Brundlefly" 6, during an attempt to test his new teleportation machine.
As he attempts the test, unknowingly he enters the machine with a fly but the machine is
unable to teleport the two beings separately, so it ends up merging them, creating an
unknown creature. According to William Beard, "this otherness receives the most foreign
organic form and the most disgusting that the imagination of the film can conceive: an
insect ” 7, and here begins the slow metamorphosis of the scientist into a fly. While in
Franz Kafka's novel the protagonist, Gregor Samsa wakes up one morning for his job as a

4 KAFKA, Franz. La Métamorphose. Gallimard. Paris, France : Claude David, 2015, p. 23.
5 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit., p. 221 .
6 Hybrid between man and fly.
7 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit., p. 200,

Page 7! of 38
!
travel salesman unable to leave because he has been inexplicably transformed into a huge
insect and has to endure the burden his metamorphosis has left on his family who count
on him as the main and only source of income. Despite the differences in the context in
which each work was set, both essentially tell the same story of a man who transformed
into some kind of insect, which is the initial indicator that the earlier work served as an
inspiration for the latter. Furthermore, it is important to note that the most obvious
similarity between the two works begins with their titles. These two works have titles
which refer very clearly to the world of insects, "the fly" is an insect while
"metamorphosis" is defined as being the process of deep transformation that an insect
undergoes while passing from the larval state to the pupal state and of it in the adult or
imaginal state 8 , but this word can also mean the complete modification of the character,
the state of someone, the aspect or the form of something 9 , a point which is quite
characteristic of the scenarios of these two works, since the two main characters succumb
not only to a physical metamorphosis, but also to a character development that changes
the way they perceive themselves and the world around them, thus making each of them
entirely different beings at the beginning of the works and at their end. At the start of The
Fly, Seth Brundle is more or less an enthusiastic and ambitious scientist, with many
dreams and aspirations and above all a goal, but as his physical metamorphosis begins he
gradually becomes proud, aggressive, angry and intense, slowly pushing back his love
interest in the movie, Veronica (or Ronnie), which he would never have done in human
form. For example, in the first half of the movie, after Seth's transformation started but
right before he really realized it did, Veronica who was once the person closest to him,
went to visit him because she was concerned for his well-being. Once there, she instantly
recognizes that he cheated on her when she sees a woman leaving his apartment, she
ignores this and expresses her concern to Seth regarding his well-being but he
aggressively rejects her, to the point of calling her jealous. He even goes so far as to
knock and destroy the walls of his apartment to prove to her that he is not sick. Finally,
when she begs him to let her help him, he pushes her violently out of his apartment. On
the other hand, before his metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa, is implied to be the only source

8 Larousse (s. d.). Métamorphosis.

9 Idem

Page 8! of 38
!
of income for his family, but as his metamorphosis suddenly appears, his mental state
deteriorates rapidly, making him not only useless to his family but also a burden on them.
Gregor even evokes his dissatisfaction with his professional life in the first chapter of the
book, when he says: “If I did not hold back because of my parents, I would have resigned
a long time ago, I would have presented my resignation to the boss and I would have told
him my way of thinking, from the bottom of my heart” 10. This brings me to the next
point of similarity between the works, namely that the two main characters are defined by
their professional lives.
Not only is Gregor Samsa the main source of income for his family, but he's also
so engrossed in his work that his main concern when he wakes up as a massive bug is
knowing he's going to be late for his job, worrying more about the consequences this may
have on his professional performance rather than the fact that he is no longer human. In
the book, even after discovering his sudden transformation, he says to himself: "But
anyway, for the moment, I have to get up, because my train leaves at five o'clock" 11,

proving how busy he is with work, even to the point of delirium. On the other hand, at the
start of The Fly, Seth Brundle seems like the typical geeky scientist who barely has a
social life and doesn't know how to approach a woman romantically, in other words,
"there is a relationship between Seth's scientific inventiveness and his sexual retardation”
12. All Seth really knows is his job, since his invention is his biggest motivation, it takes
all of his time and it will soon transform his whole life, quite literally. The film even
begins during a science press event, which is where he meets Veronica, his love interest.
It also sets the tone for the relationship because it's the one thing that distracts Seth from
his job, since the reason Seth turns into a fly is because he got drunk from the jealousy
that he felt when Veronica went to see her ex, after her first night with Seth. Proof that
Seth's work is a dominant aspect of his life, to the point of affecting even other aspects,
like his love life. In addition, Seth's infatuation with his invention materializes in the last
scene of the film, which I will expand on in Chapter III. Finally, the two main characters

10 KAFKA, Franz, op. cit., p. 11.

11 Idem., p. 12.
12 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit., p. 203

Page 9! of 38
!
have a mission, whether it's to provide for their families or to invent a teleportation
machine that changes humanity.
Now, I would like to state the visual and descriptive similarities between the two
works in terms of the physical and behavioral alterations of the two protagonists. As
Gregor Samsa's mental and physical condition begins to deteriorate, so does the room he
is in, and so does Seth Brundle. Gregor's space, which was once a normal bedroom,
slowly transforms into a dark cave where the family dumps their trash, this is normally
the kind of environment any normal cockroach would live in. In the novel, the obscene
state of the room is described in a passage from the second chapter which says: “the
cleaning of the room, which she now always looked after in the evening, could hardly
have been done faster. [..], streaks of filth spread over the walls, little clusters of dust and
dirt intermingled lay here and there on the ground” 13 . Seth Brundle's apartment, which
was once very clean and organized, very characteristic of his sane state of mind at the
start of the film, slowly deteriorates at the rhythm of his physical metamorphosis. The
apartment gets sloppy, dirty and messy towards the end of the movie. Finally, it is obvious
that there is a certain direct correlation between the state of physical environments and the
state of their inhabitants, in other words, the physical environment around creatures is the
second most apparent indicator of their metamorphosis, because it is a direct
materialization of their negative transformation, whether mental or physical. I would like
to mention two identical passages in the film and the book in which the two creatures are
seen suspended from their ceilings by a woman in each other's life. Even for the novel,
this passage is described in a very visual way and quite similar to the film: “It was then
that Grete's gaze and Gregor's gaze met [...], but Grete's words had rather worried her
mother, who stepped aside, saw the gigantic brown stain on the floral wallpaper and,
before realizing that it was Gregor she was seeing, shouted in a strangled voice “Ah, my
God! Ah, my God! ”, To fall down, arms outstretched as if she was giving up everything,
on the sofa, where she did not move” 14 . As for the film, in the fourth stage of his
metamorphosis, Seth is more agile than ever, especially when he discovers he can climb
walls, to which he is interrupted by Veronica, when she finds him hanging from his

13 KAFKA, Franz, op. cit., p. 48.

14 Idem., p. 41.

Page !10 of 38
!
ceiling. Finally, the last visual and descriptive similarity between the two works concerns
the nutrition of creatures. In the film, there is an excerpt in which “Brundlefly”
documents his evolution by filming himself, he titled one of the sequences “How Does
Brundlefly Eat? », And gives a visual demonstration of the process of feeding a fly which
consists of regurgitating an acidic substance on the food to break it down and this will
facilitate its consumption. As for Gregor Samsa, he is unable to consume human food and
begins to eat the garbage that his family throws in his room. In a passage from the novel,
Grete, Gregor's sister, offers him food, “for there was a bowl of sweet milk there, in
which pieces of white bread had been cut. For a little, he would have laughed with joy, for
he was even hungrier than in the morning, and he immediately plunged his head into this
milk, almost up to his eyes. But he soon withdrew it with disappointment ” 15.
More generally, in both works, the main characters are subject to the judgment of
others, although they are not both judged by the same people, they are always confronted
with the concern of being perceived by the people that they love. Gregor Samsa instantly
loses the respect of his boss at work, “he stepped away from the door; propelled himself
through the opening; wanted to advance towards the representative, who already on the
landing and was clinging ridiculously with both hands to the banister; but immediately,
trying to find something to hold onto, he fell back with a little cry on all his little paws” 16
and also quickly loses the love and respect of his family because he catches them talking
about their disdain and disgust for him. Alternatively, Seth Brundle has no one in his life
except Veronica, who unlike Gregor's family, doesn't instantly abandon Seth but slowly
begins to fear him and be disgusted with his appearance, which makes her incredibly sad.
In an attempt to stay in touch with their human side, Seth Brundle and Gregor
Samsa are both attached to something in the works that reminds them of the sexual aspect
of their manhood. Gregor Samsa, leaves his bedroom in insect form to keep a painting of
a woman wearing a fur coat that hangs in the living room, because it reminds him of his
attraction to the opposite sex and by extension his humanity, “It was then that hung on the
otherwise bare wall the image of the lady only in fur jumped out to him; he quickly
climbed up to her and leaned against the glass, which held him back […] This image, at

15 Idem., p. 27.
16 Idem., p. 28.

Page !11 of !38

least, which Gregor now covered entirely, one could be sure that no one was going to take
it away from him. ” 17. On the other hand, Seth Brundle, although continuing to push
Veronica away, is still strangely very attached to her, since not only is he in love with her,
and has also had sex with her, but she is also the mother of his unborn child, who he
believes is potentially the only human aspect of him that remains. This attachment he has
towards Veronica, leads him to behave in aggressive and irrational ways, like kidnapping
her when she is about to have an abortion and threatening her life towards the end of the
movie, which brings me to my last point, which is that at the end of the two works, the
two main characters die, and that brings peace to the people around them. Unlike Seth
Brundle, Gregor Samsa was never a danger to the safety of his family, he was just a
discomfort for them as they found it difficult to rent rooms in their house to people for
fear that Gregor would disgust them. Besides, according to Susan Bernofsky, “unlike
'Brundlefly', Gregor is no threat to anyone but himself, and he starves and disappears as
his family revel in their freedom from the shameful burden and embarrassment that he has
become” 18. In the book, they are described as being more aggressive towards the creature
than the creature was towards them. Gregor always understood their hatred towards him,
and since he didn't want to be a burden on them anymore, he just let himself die,
something that made his family very happy, even though they felt a little guilty, they went
on with their lives as if Gregor never existed. While Seth endangered a pregnant Veronica
and Veronica's boss, who had come to her rescue. After a fight, Seth, like Gregor, had
accepted his fate and silently asked Veronica to end her and his misery by shooting him in
the head with a gun, which she had to do with it a lot of courage.
Finally, the final similarity between the two works is that the two share similar
themes and feelings. The first theme represented in the two works is the theme of
alienation to which the two main characters are subjected. Seth Brundle, an already lonely
scientist, slowly pushes away the one person who loves him, something that leaves him
entirely alone, paranoid of everything around him, and alienated. Gregor Samsa, on the
other hand, is alienated from his family, he becomes extremely lonely and rarely interacts

17 Idem., p. 47.
18
BERNOFSKY, Susan. The Metamorphosis: A New Translation by Susan Bernofsky. W. W.
Norton & Company. New York : 2013, 2013, p. 4

Page !12 of 38
!
with anyone, despite living with his family, which makes him very lonely. The second
theme that the two works share is that of the loss of identity. In The Fly we see Seth
slowly losing his sense of identity as he transforms, he transforms physically but his
character also changes entirely from the start of the film, "the condition takes the form of
a horrible physical metamorphosis, associated with the most extreme otherness, with the
loss of identity and finally with death. ” 19. Whereas, in The Metamorphosis, Gregor
Samsa begins forgetting who he was before his transformation, resonating entirely with
his insect behavior more than his human past. Finally, the last but major theme common
to both works is the theme of transformation, which appears in both the plot, titles and
character development of the main characters in both works.
Finally, with all of these similarities, director David Cronenberg may have used
The Metamorphosis of Franz Kafka as inspiration for his work in The Fly, but perhaps
also in his other works.

2. The Kafkaesque influence in the rest of Cronenberg's films.

In this subsection I would like to further develop the Kafkaesque inspiration in

David Cronenberg's filmography. As it is established that David Cronenberg may have
been inspired by The Metamorphosis of Franz Kafka in the creation of his film The Fly, it
could be that the director used the writer's work as a source of inspiration for the rest of
the films in his filmography, because there are other similarities between the work of the
writer and the work of the director.
The very first apparent similarity between the two works is the iconography of
insects found primarily in The Fly, but which also exists in other Cronenberg films. With
the first film being Rabid, written and directed in 1977, this film may not focus on the
world of insects but borrows some aspects of it, in particular a bodily trait which is a
stinger that develops under the arm of the protagonist, Rose. An unusual body distortion
as it is usually characteristic of many insects to have such a part of the body, especially in
bees and hornets. Additionally, Rose uses this stinger to suck blood from the bodies of her

19 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit., p. 199

Page !13 of 38
!
victims to feed on them, which is the exact survival mechanism of a fly. The symbolic
reference to the insect universe is quite subtle in this movie, but it's still the main premise,
for example, at the very beginning of the movie, when Rose wakes up from her coma in
the hospital, she frantically calls for help and another patient comes in to console her, she
instantly hugs him, to try to attract him, as a predator would do with his prey, and that's
when she stings him, soaking up all of his blood and infecting him.
In 1979 David Cronenberg wrote and directed The Brood, and although this film
also barely evokes the theme of insects, it contains a very symbolic scene that takes place
towards the end of the film, in which the protagonist, Nola, exhibits her body to her ex-
husband, showing him that she has developed a bodily mutation which allows her to
conceive children quickly, although they are not really normal children, they are mutated
beings, named "the brood", whose only objective is to serve Nola, their “mother”. This
iconography is more reminiscent of a queen bee, laying several bee eggs that will obey all
her commands and follow her everywhere, just as "the brood" obey Nola.
Finally, David Cronenberg wrote and directed Naked Lunch in 1991, a film
adapted from a 1959 novel by writer William S. Burroughs, but Cronenberg decided to set
the novel in a world of insects, where the insecticide is a drug. This film contains the
most influence of insect imagery, as it is heavily evoked in many scenes of the film, for
example, at the start of the film, the protagonist is called in for an investigation, in which
two men inspect the insecticide which he uses to kill the bugs, soon after they send a
massive bug to test the impact of the insecticide on it, but it turns out that the bug is
actually an officer who has a mission for the protagonist with instructions from "Control"
to kill his wife. It is important to note that Franz Kafka is even mentioned at the very
beginning of the film, in a scene where the protagonist's wife sniffs the insecticide, she
asks her husband if he would like it, and she calls the experience "a Kafka high, you feel
like a bug ” 20.
I will now talk about the influence of Kafkaesque themes on the work of David
Cronenberg. Starting with the theme of transformation, at the physical and mental level.
The Fly and The Metamorphosis share themes of bodily transformation and mutation, but
The Fly isn't the only film that depicts this tale. In Rabid, the protagonist develops a sting

20 Said by Joan Lee in Naked Lunch (1991)

Page !14 of 38
!
under her armpit, but her transformation isn't just physical. The sting she develops gives
her the role of a predator, so her entire existence is instantly defined by her mutation. She
starts off as a vulnerable victim of a motorcycle accident but quickly becomes a huntress,
I will develop this point in more detail in Chapter II. Kafka's work often takes place in a
nightmarish environment, which also exists in Cronenberg's filmography. Cronenberg,
like Franz Kafka, creates nightmarish universes in which hellish situations happen to his
protagonists without obvious explanation, this is the case in Rabid, in The Brood, and
also more generally, in Videodrome (1983) and in Existenz (1999). ). Except that there is
a nuance in Videodrome and in Existenz which is that in these works, unlike the others,
we begin to question the reality of the universe of the story, this is also present in the
nightmarish universe of Kafka, in which the reader begins to question the reality of the
universe he is reading. I will develop this point in more detail in Chapter III.

Page !15 of 38
!
Chapter II. Dehumanization of the human body

It is established that the human body is often the focal point of many works by
David Cronenberg. The director experiments the human body, often distorting it to
convey a dark commentary on our modern society. You could even say that the body is
Cronenberg's tool, which is what earned him his fame in the body horror sub-genre. That
being said, in the director's filmography I am able to distinguish two categories, and in
this part I will develop the first one. I was able to identify a common thread between all
the films in this category, which represents the way in which David Cronenberg
experiments on the bodies of his protagonists by giving them a certain mutation or
metamorphosis, which dehumanizes them entirely, hence the title of this part, “the
dehumanization of the human body”. In this category, the director often reduces the
protagonists of his films to their primitive, instinctive, and animal nature, and sometimes
literally turns them into animals. The nuance is that these transformations only occur after
these protagonists undergo a medical, physical or psychological intervention that changes
not only their physical appearance but also their mental state, this modification is always
negative. In doing so, in this part, I will be talking about a group of films that explain how
David Cronenberg uses scientific intervention on the human body to highlight the dangers
of modern experimental science and their impact on humans. There are three sample films
for this category, and each of them represents the danger of a different science.

1. Rabid (1977)

Rabid is the first film in the category, but before I elaborate on this film, I must
mention Shivers, which is indeed David Cronenberg's very first film that served as a
commentary on the danger of modern science, moreover, “the story contained in Rabid is
a simple extension and elaboration of the ideas and plot of Shivers” 21. Written and
produced in 1975, Shivers's plot revolves around the viral spread of an artificial virus. In

21WILSON, Scott . Politics of Insects: David Cronenberg's Cinema of Confrontation.

Continuum. New York : Katie Gallof, 2011, p. 49

Page !16 of 38
!
an apartment complex, a scientist creates a virus that should take over the function of a
human organ, but instead the virus turns anyone infected with it into a sex maniac, and
soon everyone in the complex is infected with it. Likewise, Rabid is based on the same
general plot as Shivers, but in this film the director pushes the aspect of body horror even
further by creating a nationwide pandemic that originated from a simple surgery, point
made by William Beard who says that, "What is different between them is their scale:
where Shivers discusses the development and spread of a body-altering plague among the
inhabitants of a single building, Rabid plays the concept of a body-altering plague in a
populated cityscape” 22. As stated in the title of the film, this viral virus turns its victims
into rabid creatures that mindlessly attack each other like animals, but unlike common
rabies, the virus in Rabid does not come from an animal, but from a human. The origin of
the virus stems from a medical procedure in which a surgeon uses morphogenetically
neutral grafts on a patient's body to replace damaged skin and organs after her motorcycle
accident, “all medical projects have disastrous consequences, including for their authors”
23. This experimental medical intervention had caused a certain genetic mutation, because
the patient suddenly woke up from a coma a month later having inexplicably developed a
stinger in the armpit. This new addition to her body, (“located in her armpit is a pleated
orifice which hides a phallic protuberance, armed with a deadly spike at its end” 24 ),

becomes not only a weapon but essentially the protagonist's source of life, because as this
mutation develops, she uses it to absorb the blood of the victims she stings. Essentially,
this mutation suddenly turns this innocent victim of a motorcycle accident into a
bloodsucking monster, a modern take on the classic vampire. In the film, we see her
slowly taking victim after victim, and with each victim, Rose loses her humanity more
and more, she transforms into a huntress, whose only goal is to survive, and the urban
setting in which the film takes place suddenly becomes a jungle in which once resided
civilized humans who have suddenly turned into rabid animals. When a victim is stung,
they immediately lose sensation in the area of the injury and also lose their memory of the

22 Idem., p. 50,
23 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit., p. 51
24 WILSON, Scott. op. cit., p. 50

Page !17 of 38
!
incident, the next day the victim turns into a zombie which uncontrollably bites everyone
in its vicinity, which is the main cause of the spread of the disease.
In this film, the dehumanization of the human body takes place on two successive
levels, starting with the sudden transformation of the protagonist from an innocent victim
of a motorcycle accident into a ruthless predator. Although her physical transformation
happened overnight, her loss of humanity takes longer to kick in, Rose seems unaware of
her actions, sometimes seeking help from the medics, then suddenly escaping from the
hospital to find another victim, but although the consequences her actions are colossal,
the question of Rose's innocence remains a dominant theme throughout the film as she
never wanted this transformation, she essentially cannot control its fate, this is where the
commentary on experimental medicine takes place. Rose is not to blame, since she is not
the villain of the film in the general sense of the word, she too behaves without thinking,
but we are also unable to blame the surgeon since that was never his intentions. As
Wilson also points out, “whatever Keloid's good intentions, Rose is just as much a victim
of his science” 25. The blame then falls only on the need for modernism, it is the need to
experiment that David Cronenberg comments. In this film, the dehumanization of the
human body also occurs in the rapid transformation of Rose's victims into mindless
zombies, which is once again a direct consequence of the need to experiment.
In conclusion, it is clear that in Rabid, David Cronenberg shares a commentary on
the experimental methods of modern medicine based on the loss of identity of the
characters in his films, which manifests itself through their physical dehumanization.

2. The Brood (1979)

The second film in the category is The Brood. Directed two years after Rabid, The
Brood is considered to be a “psychological” body horror film, unlike Cronenberg’s
previous works, as this film explores the realm of contemporary psychology. In The
Brood, the main character is Nola who suffers from mental health problems and
undergoes isolated psychological treatment in which a therapist uses controversial therapy
techniques to reach out to her childhood traumas, ("we were introduced to psychoplasmic

25 Idem., p. 52

Page !18 of 38
!
and its somatic wonders and horrors ... but we were also keenly drawn into a realm of
traumatic psychological suffering rooted in family oppression.” 26). It is obvious that the
theme of childhood is predominant in this film. Along with the woman's psychological
treatment, her family members are brutally and inexplicably murdered, starting with her
mother and soon her father, the two people who played a huge role in the development of
her childhood trauma and mental illness. As a result of this experimental psychological
treatment “which involves intensive role-playing in order to make literal the rage of the
body as psychosomatic symptoms, thus probing the original impulses and leaving the
patient clean and healthy” 27, the woman has developed a very strange phenomenon
which allows her to give birth to non-human children, who obey her orders to kill the
people in her life who hurt her, based on how she feels about them. These non-human
“children”, called “the brood”, are therefore at the origin of the murders of Nola's parents.
Essentially, in this film, David Cronenberg has created a universe in which
contemporary psychological practice is the main cause of murder, through, again,
inexplicable bodily mutation. Essentially, due to the psychological intervention, Nola's
trauma materializes in killer children, in other words, “the brood by Nola Carveth -
childish creatures produced by her body who are walking embodiments of her feelings”
28, which is quite symbolic given that his trauma stems from her youth, almost as if her
“inner child” is taking revenge. Hence the use of the description “psychological body
horror”, in this film the director uses psychology to justify body horror, and body horror
to demonstrate the psychological state of the character, the two dimensions of the film are
therefore complementary.
When it comes to dehumanizing the human body, again, just like in Rabid, this
happens on two successive levels. Nola's dehumanization begins after she seeks help to
cope with her childhood trauma caused by her parents, the psychologist helping her,
Raglan, uses the bizarre method of reintroducing the moments of the patients' youth to
rekindle certain feelings that may have been suppressed, and with Nola he reached levels
he never thought possible. These therapeutic practices have caused the body of the

26 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p. 75
27 WILSON, Scott. op. cit., p. 152
28 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p. 71

Page !19 of 38
!
protagonist to deform. Slowly instead of dealing with her emotions, Nola's body began to
produce murderous beings to unleash her rage by killing her "enemies", as if that was her
defense mechanism.
Dehumanizing Nola's body doesn't have to be animal, but rather like a machine,
she becomes a child-making machine, and her body is unable to function in a normal
setting. The more she deals with her negative emotions, the more her body produces these
creatures to deal with her problems. There is also the dehumanization of the children of
Nola, “the brood”. The first non-human thing about these creatures is that they do not
have a father, which immediately indicates that their birth is not human. In chapter I,
when I made an analogy with the world of insects, comparing Nola to a queen bee, since
there is never a king, only a queen bee that the hive only follows, very similar to Nola and
her “children”. Although they may look like small children, on a physical level, "the
brood" are more like aliens, from a police autopsy in the film, we learn that the children
are described as being asexual, color blind, without teeth and without a belly button
(which is essentially necessary for a normal childbirth). That being said, their greatest
dehumanization is not in their physical trait, but rather in their animal behavior. These
mutated child creatures behave at their mother's instinct, they obey her without thinking,
which connects them more to animals than to humans, as if they were well-trained
hunting dogs.
Finally, to conclude, David Cronenberg uses the medium of psychology in this
film to emphasize the aspect of body horror. This film clearly comments on the results of
irresponsible experiments in therapy methods to deal with the mental state of humans for
research. The common thread of this category begins to appear since in this film too it is
the need to experiment which is to be blamed, even if the psychologist is arrogant and not
totally innocent, he did not intend for the mutation to take place.
It is through the mutation of the main character's body that David Cronenberg
dehumanizes the human body to comment on the dangers of experimental psychology by
creating an extreme fictional scenario of the materialization of an ill-treated mental
illness.

3. The Fly (1986)

Page !20 of 38
!
 The last film in the category is a film that I have already analyzed, but which I
will briefly recall to emphasize the common thread of the category, it is The Fly. In order
to understand the modern science commentary in this film, it is essential to ask yourself
why the whole situation has happened. Seth Brundle, a young scientist, has invented a
teleportation machine, when he first meets his love interest in the film, Veronica. After
finding out that she had gone to visit her ex, Seth gets drunk and without thinking enters
the machine, in an attempt to test its validity on human teleportation, something that had
yet to be tested. Due to his inebriation, unknowingly, Seth had entered the machine with a
fly, and upon exiting, he comes out merged with it, creating a hybrid creature between
man and fly, known as "Brundlefly" in the movie. Since the premise is pretty clear, so is
the commentary on the dangers of the irresponsible use of machines that defy the laws of
physics, it is interesting to talk about Seth's multiple phases of transformation, in other
words, “Seth goes completely from human to inhuman [...], here, genetic splicing is the
culprit, bringing us back to the horrors of genetics ” 29. Seth's transformation is gradual, it
reaches its peak at the end of the film but doesn't quickly reveal itself as a negative thing,
in fact at first Seth is proud of his transformation, since it started giving him superhuman
powers, like for example, more stamina during sex, his physical strength, lack of fatigue
and alertness, but the illusion of "Brundlefly" quickly shatters as his physical appearance
begins to deteriorate, he slowly begins to develop insect traits, a real metamorphosis.
When his physical appearance is affected and he begins to develop insect behavior,
"Brundlefly" documents his transformation for his research. Once the final phase of Seth's
transformation is reached, he has completely lost his humanity, and we can start to see
him as the villain of the film, although the question of his guilt is the same as the previous
films, Seth is the only reason for his own transformation but remains blameless, quite
simply because he never intend for that to happen. Once again, David Cronenberg
comments on the need for experimentation, not the recklessness of humans.
In a specific scene in the film, the dehumanization of the human body occurs in a
dream, when Veronica, pregnant with Seth's child, dreams that the child is a massive
worm and wakes up wanting an abortion. I would like to compare this scene to a scene

29 LOPEZ CRUZ, Ronald Allan. op. cit. p. 164

Page !21 of 38
!
from a 1979 film, Alien by director Ridley Scott. This movie was made almost seven
years before The Fly, and yet the scenes are surprisingly similar. When the Alien space
team has a peaceful dinner together, suddenly one of them starts choking and lies down
on the dining table with terrible pain, when all of a sudden he starts bleeding from his
chest and a worm-like alien comes out of his body through his stomach, as if he was a
pregnant woman. This scene from Alien was first adapted in a John Carpenter film, The
Thing (1982), in which an alien who takes the form of a human, reveals himself through
the human, violently coming out of his stomach, just like in Alien. I have to note that
although Seth has transformed into an insect, he looks a lot more like an alien by the end
of the movie, which could indicate that David Cronenberg may have taken inspiration
from alien films in the creation of his film, that might make sense, since the farthest thing
from a human is an alien, a point that confirms the dehumanization narrative. In other
words, it's no coincidence that David Cronenberg gave Seth Brundle alien-like
characteristics in order to better convey the main character's utter loss of humanity, to the
point of not even resembling anything that could even reside on earth, instead Seth totally
looks like an alien, and we can go so far as to say he even looks a bit like "Xenomorph
XX12", which is the adult alien species in Alien, this creature has a human figure, with a
strange insect-like head, much like "Brundlefly". In addition, Ronald Allen Lopez Cruz
says that “the best examples of body horror are The Thing, The Fly and the Alien
franchise” 30.
In conclusion, the dehumanization of the human body takes place through Seth
Brundle's metamorphosis into a fly, which David Cronenberg uses to again describe the
dangers of defying the laws of physics.

30 Idem. , p. 162

Page !22 of 38
!
Chapter III. The humanization of the non-living.

To convey his commentary on the dangers of irresponsible use of modern science,

David Cronenberg dehumanizes humans in his films, often reducing them to animals, but
what about films like Videodrome, Existenz and Crash? Even though they are all
different, these films still share a common thread and in this chapter III, I will present the
themes and common stories between these films by analyzing them. This common thread
consists of the humanization or the fetishization of inanimate objects in order to
symbolize their power in our society. However, in this category there are two
subcategories, in the first we have the films in which David Cronenberg brings objects to
life by assigning them characteristics of the human body, as in Videodrome, and in the
second we have the films in which Cronenberg represents the same account of the
addiction that humans have on the machine but this time in a figurative sense, through the
satirical fetishization of these modern technological products. Be that as it may, even if
the common thread can manifest itself in two ways, either through "the technologization
of the body or the biologization of technology" 31, it all comes down to the same story of
humanizing what is not alive to make a satirical social commentary on the major role that
the media play in our society and in particular in terms of the influence it has on our
perception of reality. In some of his films, David Cronenberg goes so far as to merge man
and machine to accentuate this dependence, that is to say to metaphorize the capitalist
society in which there is coexistence between humans and machines, (" postmodern
technological interweaving and media bombardment in a system of material exploitation
of late capitalism. ”32). That being said, in this part I will be talking about a group of four
films, two of which depict the tale of the object transforming into living organisms, and
two more depict the tale of the man becoming the machine.

31HOTCHKISS, Lia M. “Still in the Game”: Cybertransformations of the “New Flesh” in David
Cronenberg's eXistenZ. The Velvet Light Trap, vol. 52, 2003, p. 17
32 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p. 125,

Page !23 of 38
!
1. “Mediamorphosis” 33

In this sub-category, David Cronenberg applies the metamorphosis narrative in a

very different context from the one of the films analyzed in Chapter II, that of modern
media. In these films, he humanizes the machines used for media dissemination, in order
to convey the role they play in our society. In Videodrome it’s a television and in Existenz
it's a virtual reality video game, and in these two films reality is put in question, since
even the protagonists are unable to tell the difference between what is real and what is
not. A metaphor for the power of media in our modern society, which often leads us to
question the validity of the massive amount of information we absorb on a daily basis.

A. Videodrome (1983)

The very first film, made in 1983 is Videodrome, in which the protagonist, Max,
the president of a television channel is desperately looking for new TV program to attract
viewers, when he stumbles upon "Videodrome", a television show devoted to sexual
torture, Max airs the show on his channel thinking it is a potential success. However, after
seeing his girlfriend star on the show, Max investigates "Videodrome" and slowly begins
to wonder if what he is seeing is real or not. In the film, the programming of
"Videodrome" is in fact a means of indoctrination of those who watch it, controlled by
large authorities, in order to achieve a mass genocide of all individuals who watch torture
pornography. This begs the question of Max's morality, who is in fact trying to stop the
operation. It is not known whether the observer should be on the side of the protagonist,
since he is fighting against the dissemination of mass false information that seeks to
brainwash the population, or against the protagonist and with the genocide of people who
find pleasure in sexual torture. This philosophical dilemma is one way of highlighting
David Cronenberg's personal reflections on the dangers of mass media and his skepticism
on technological entertainment. On the movie poster, there is a slogan which says “first it
controls your mind, then it destroys your body” . This slogan explains exactly the effect
of “Videodrome” on its audience, first of all, the programming indoctrinates them and

33 Inspired by Shai Biderman's book, Mediamorphosis: Kafka and the Moving Image.

Page !24 of 38
!
they hallucinate, and then they start to notice transformations in their bodies, and that's
exactly what happens to the protagonist.
Before I analyze Max's metamorphosis, I have to mention a quote from the movie
that is spoken over and over and that is "Long Live The New Flesh", this quote almost
sounds like a political slogan, in fact in my interpretation it references the dependence
that humans have on their technologies to the point of it even becoming their second skin.
In other words, I think it's a way of welcoming a society that promotes this codependency.
It seems to me that this movie is more relevant now than in the year of its release because
we are unable to leave the house without our phones, making our phones our new skin,
it's almost as if David Cronenberg predicted the future of our society through this film.
Regardless, when Max first watches "Videodrome," he succumbs to a few bodily
mutations that correspond to his loss of identity due to the indoctrination. According to
William Beard, this film offers us “a sort of paranoid postmodern model of the
manipulation of private defenseless individuals by predatory corporate forces under
conditions of universal technological penetration and colonization” 34, this is evident in a
specific scene of the film in which Max develops a vertical opening in his belly which at
first glance looks like a vagina, this may accentuate Max's loss of masculinity in the film
especially when later on, one of the authority figures tells him "Open Up To Me ”and
inserts his arm inside him to place a VHS tape, indeed “this act of penetration is a sadistic
act, [...] and he thus fulfills his role in the film as symbol of the sadistic sexual desires that
Max wishes to realize, but which come true at his expense” 35 . This event has a lot of
violent sexual undertones and a direct link to Max's loss of masculinity which actually
represents his loss of control over his life and identity because he is no longer in charge of
his mind, Videodrome is. When the VHS cassette is inserted into the vertical opening in
Max's stomach, it no longer looks vaginal but rather analog as he literally becomes a VHS
tape player, it's actually quite an interesting picture, because it reflects the transformation
of a man into machine, representing the dependence between man and machine in our
modern society. This event is reminiscent of “Long Live The New Flesh”, since Max's
transformation into a VHS player is the embodiment of this slogan. Shortly after the band

34 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p. 24
35 Idem., p. 147

Page !25 of 38
!
is inserted into him, Max puts his hand into his stomach and pulls out a pistol. This
weapon slowly merges with Max's hand, to the point that the hand turns into a pistol
(“Max's hallucinations give him a vagina; but they also provide him with a 'new penis',
this is the Fleshgun, a tool for 'murder and finally suicide ”36). The fusion of Max and the
pistol highlights his loss of control over the machine, in other words, Max is fragile in the
face of the pistol and this weapon now defines his reality and changes his identity, once
again, this time around from a nonviolent being to a killing machine. So here is David
Cronenberg's social commentary on the power of media portrayal of violence and how it
indoctrinates people to be inherently violent. However, I have explained the main themes
of the film, I will now present and analyze the narrative of the humanization of the non-
living by giving them human bodily characteristics and personifying them in the film in
order to show the power that these objects hold on the humans in the movie, and how that
symbolises the addiction people have now developed to machines.
In one scene from the film, Max, in his apartment, grabs a VHS tape and suddenly
drops it when he feels it breathe and let out a moan in a female voice. He grabs the VHS
tape, inspects it and then inserts it into his television, he begins to watch a man talk about
"Videodrome" and the validity of what is seen on television. This man describes watching
television as a "raw experience, so television is reality and reality is less than television" ,
a statement Max finds amusing, but he stops laughing as soon as the TV man speaks to
him. The TV man reveals the secret of "Videodrome" to Max by telling him that watching
the programming is a form of mass brainwashing and it causes brain tumors to all of its
viewers, but since he had revealed too much, this man is murdered on the air by Nicki,
Max's love interest in the film. After Nicki reveals herself to Max, she starts trying to
seduce him with words to entice him to come to her, and it works, Max gets closer and
closer on TV. Suddenly, as we hear Nicki breathing heavily, Max's television begins to
mimic the movement of a breathing body, almost as if coming to life. Max puts his hands
on the TV and feels veins appear on the surface of the machine. Nicki tells him to come
closer as the TV shows a close-up image of her lips as she talks, Max strokes the TV, then
slowly inserts his face into it and kisses her. Finally, at the end of this scene, Nicki's lips
fill the television screen, which then begins to swell outwards, calling onto him until Max

36 Idem., p. 147

Page !26 of 38
!
does what she wants and he thrusts his head inside 37 . All the images in this scene are very
symbolic of the message David Cronenberg is trying to convey. The sudden shift from
murder on TV to an erotic experience between Max and TV Nicki is so absurd and shows
how desensitized we as a population have become to media violence. The personification
of television in this scene is a way for Cronenberg to highlight the power that it holds, in
fact, it is yet another portrayal of the slogan "Long Live The New Flesh", as the television
develops a breath and veins just like human skin. However, the real power that television
holds is portrayed in Max's attraction to it, although it is Nicki speaking, it is the
television reacting to Max's touch, the simplest fact that a television was able to seduce a
human in the film is a direct symbol of the real dependence humans have on these
technological entertainment products. It is important to note that the question of what is
real and what is not plays a huge role in this movie, but in this scene it is quite clear that
we are unable to distinguish between if we see real events happening or if these are all
illusions that Max experiences as a side effect of watching "Videodrome".
In conclusion, this first film sums up all the themes that will be discussed in this
chapter III, we can say that David Cronenberg has used the story of a metamorphosis in
the context of the media of our modern society and the dangers of modern technological
entertainment, in particular on the question of the validity of the information
disseminated. Finally, “the paranoid dimension of the film of social manipulation and
mind control, links individual anxieties about engulfing and transforming identity through
media images with a political analysis that asks questions about who exercises media
power and for what purposes ”38. By giving a television bodily characteristics and sexual
functions, David Cronenberg portrays the power that these media have over us, and in the
film goes so far as to cause the protagonist to kill himself because the television asks him
to do so.

B. Existenz (1999)

37 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p.154
38 BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. op. cit. p.125

Page !27 of 38
!
 The second film, although made almost twenty years later, is very similar to the
first film, because the two share very similar themes. This film was written and directed
in 1999 by David Cronenberg and is called Existenz. In it, Allegra Geller, a video game
designer, launches her new virtual reality video game called "eXistenZ", but after an
assassination attempt is made on her life by a radical anti-virtual reality group, Allegra is
forced to flee with a young man named Ted, and he becomes her protector. In an attempt
to save her video game, Allegra implants the video game module that contains a damaged
copy of "eXistenZ" into Ted's body, and throughout the film, Allegra and Ted engage in a
series of experiments that make them question what is real and what is illusion, indeed,
according to Lia M. Hotchkiss, “in the service of this theme, the film Existenz
destabilizes the sense of reality in the spectators in a playful and self-explanatory
extension. - reflective of David Cronenberg's continuous exploration of bodily
transformation through technology which is also a return to the media ” 39.
In analyzing this movie, it's hard to base myself on a single scene, because no
scene encapsulates all of the themes and plot twists that exist in Existenz, so instead I'll
mention any example of a visual representation of the humanization of inanimate objects,
that is, the design of the modern technological entertainment device, the video game. I
will explain how David Cronenberg embodies the addiction humans have on the machine,
through his construction of the video game system and the universe of "eXistenZ", which
is a universe based on sex and violence. However, it is important to say that the aspect of
body horror in the film is also partially portrayed through the grotesque quality of the
film, when it comes to gore, but mainly, through the sexual nature of how “eXistenZ”
works.
The device is introduced early in the film, as we see Allegra and her fans test out
the video game. This video game looks like a deformed humanoid creature, "when these
organic pods are damaged, it would be better to say injured, ... because they are placed on
some kind of operating table and looked after by a group of surgeons, who simply remove
damaged parts and replace them by new ”40 . At the surface level it has human skin, and

39 HOTCHKISS, Lia M. op. cit. p.17

40ZUBOSZEK, Mateusz. L’influence de la technologie sur le corps et l’esprit humains dans les
films de David Cronenberg. Spécialisation en philologie anglaise: Bielsko-Biała: Université de
technologie et de sciences humaines de Bielsko-Biała, Faculté des sciences humaines: 2007. p. 20

Page !28 of 38
!
this skin mimics the sexual movements of the body and moans when touched by the
player, but the most sexual aspect of the game system is its activation, which involves
plugging an umbilical cord linked to the game, into the player's nervous system
(specifically the neck or lower back), which means that in order to play the game, players
have to go through a process of piercing their bodies. This visual representation is
reminiscent of a number of things, on the one hand, while the existence of an umbilical
cord reminds us of the birth of a child, it could possibly mean that between the player and
the system there is a symbiotic relationship, we even see Allegra, an emotionally distant
character, fondling the game as if it were her child. Second, in the sexual portrayal of the
game, it is not surprising that the piercing procedure that is done on the players' bodies is
located in the lower back, in fact, when Allegra urges Ted to do the procedure, he
specifically says "I'm afraid to get penetrated", this highlights the violent sexual nature of
"eXistenZ" and could possibly remind us of the concept of virginity, specifically the
concept of losing your virginity, because Ted is afraid to do the deed at the beginning, but
he is urged by his pairs to do it, moreover according to Mr. Pomerance, “when playing
eXistenZ, the portals are so routinized that they can be a second anus at the base of the
spine ”41. Once he has finished the procedure, Ted, who at the beginning of the film was a
very innocent character, begins to change, this is one of the main themes of the game (and
the film), loss of identity. Moreover, this choice of the game module is no accident
because it is also the embodiment of the slogan that we have already heard in
Videodrome, "The New Flesh". Not only does the device have "new flesh" but it is also
hardwired to humans, so it is obvious to make an observation of the parenting metaphor
regarding the umbilical cord, implying that it is new flesh or a newborn, but also recalling
the meaning of the slogan in Videodrome, this video game could also call to a society that
promotes the addictive nature of virtual reality and the dependence that humans have on
machines, which, in indeed, could be a metaphor for our own society. In this movie, no
character is worthy of the viewer's trust, at the very beginning we start to trust Ted who
seems naive and innocent but once Ted enters the game he changes, we can't trust him
anymore, and this is because the longer the players stay inside the game the more they

41POMERANCE. M. Neither Here Nor There: ExistenZ as “Elevator Film" . Quarterly Review of
Film and Video, 20:1, 2003, p. 6

Page !29 of 38
!
lose touch with reality and with their identity, and the more they play, the more they are
unable to stop playing, which highlights evidently the addictive nature of the game,
because it gives its players an experience that they have never tried before, and in that
they can be who they want to be, which is actually exactly what Allegra says at the start
of Existenz to sell the game to spectators. At the start of the movie, Ted doesn't even carry
a weapon, but as he becomes Allegra's protector later in the movie, he has to kill all of her
enemies, which he struggles to do at first because it goes against his morals, but the
longer he stays in the game, the more the act of killing becomes instinctive to him, thus
giving him a negative character development. This is a strong representation of the power
of the game and highlights David Cronenberg's message about the addictive nature of
virtual reality and how it is changing gamers' perceptions of what is real and what is
normal ("this struggle between reason and irrationality is in fact a struggle between Ted's
and Allegra's approach to technology [...] their perception of the world is definitively
refocused but in a different way ”42 ), also desensitizing the player in murder, and in
particularly violence, since in the game Ted, all of a sudden, finds himself working in a
factory that kills animals and he does the act of killing effortlessly, his partner even tells
him in the game “it seems to come naturally to you” to which Ted replies “it's a bigger
surprise for me than for you”. However, violence and loss of identity aren't the only side
effects of 'eXistenZ', sex drives play a huge role in the movie, because when Ted first
performs his piercing procedure, he inexplicably does a sexual advance towards Allegra,
and when she asks why he did it, he replies that it was not him, that's when she explains
to him that in the game the loss of control is normal because it is not the players who act
on their impulses but in fact the characters in the game it means that the sexual acts are a
desire fueled by the game itself, so essentially the characters lose their power in favor of
the game system because it is more powerful than them.
In conclusion, according to Mateusz Zuboszek “Existenz, although set in an
imaginary sci-fi world, seems not only to shock viewers with the grotesque but also to
convey the typical message of Cronenberg [...], the traditional boundaries between the
organic and synthetic, between the body and the machine is blurred ”43. This film is David

42 ZUBOSZEK, Mateusz. op cit. p. 24

43 Idem. p. 26

Page !30 of 38
!
Cronenberg's second attempt to comment on the impact of modern media on humans
through the humanization of inanimate objects. By giving bodily characteristics to the
game module and showing us the sexual and violent impact it has on the players, David
Cronenberg highlights the addictive nature of technological entertainment and the impact
they have in redefining perception of normalcy, in terms of the desensitization of players
to violence and sex.

2. The concept of ‘Man-chine’

In this subcategory, I will present and analyze two films, with the same story of
humanizing the non-living, but instead of giving bodily features to inanimate objects, in
the two following films, David Cronenberg tries a different technique to convey his
message. In Crash, I'll analyze how David Cronenberg creates a direct correlation
between object fetishization and the unhealthy portrayal of pornography in the media,
exaggerating the strange addiction people have for their cars, and in The Fly, I'll analyze a
specific scene in which man becomes the machine, hence the title of this subsection “The
concept of 'Man-chine' ‘.

A. Crash (1996)

The first film in this sub-category, Crash, was written and directed by David
Cronenberg in 1996, and it generated a great deal of controversy when it was released
because it evokes unusual themes, even being called “technological pornography” 44 by
Mateusz Zuboszek. In his previous films, David Cronenberg represents the human body
transformed by disease and mutation but in Crash he takes a different approach to convey
his commentary, he represents the great impact of modern technology on the fragility of
humanity. While this movie is not really considered a body horror film, it still contains a
lot of body horror theme, explicitly related to the theme of human sexuality and the
violence of bodily harm caused by an car accident. In this film, the main character, James,
discovers a sex cult after his car accident, this cult introduces him to the world of

44 Idem. p. 27

Page !31 of 38
!
automobile accident fetishization which allows him to fulfill his sexual fantasies by trying
to recreate the rush of an accident. In other words, the abnormal attraction to automobile
accidents stems from the adrenaline addiction one experiences following an accident,
causing a strange fascination with death and the tendency to eroticize danger. In this film,
David Cronenberg first exaggerates the obsession and fascination that people have with
modern technological machines to the point of creating a sexual relationship between the
two and then comments on the unhealthy portrayal of pornography in modern media,
particularly in through the representation of the car itself. In order to materialize the
absurd infatuation that people have for their car, David Cronenberg creates a very erotic
image of the car by sexualizing its strength, speed and above all by representing it as a
symbol of freedom and independence, reminiscent of the sexual freedom invoked in the
film. The feeling of excitement and adrenaline the characters experience correlates
directly with their proximity to the car, making it seem as if the car is the reason for their
passion, this is mainly illustrated in the lackluster life James and his wife experience
before discovering the cult. Once they do, they finally experience intense sexual desire,
something they previously lacked in their marriage. The fact that the car is the main
reason for the excitement in the characters' lives is David Cronenberg's way of describing
how much we have become dependent on technological products to find meaning in our
lives, especially how the car has become a symbol of our independence when in reality it
represents our dependence on it.
In the movie, as James begins to explore his sexual fetishes, he meets dr. Robert
Vaughan, one of the sex cult members, and once the two have a conversation about the
nature of their sexual preference, Vaughan explains to James how "the car accident is a
fruitful event rather than a destructive one, a liberation of sexual energy. ”. After this
conversation, Vaughan invites James to attend one of the cult meetings, which James soon
discovers is actually an event to reenact James Dean's famous car crash, that, according to
Vaughan, “made him a Hollywood legend”. This event takes place in front of a large
audience of spectators which makes it a performative art form (performance art) which
favors the voyeurism of the spectators. This is a way for David Cronenberg to highlight
the voyeuristic aspect of watching pornography, since from the perspective of the
audience viewing this performative art, seeing a car crash is a sexually arousing spectacle,

Page !32 of 38
!
it highlights the absurd act of viewing pornography, especially violent pornography, as in
the videodrome program.
The satirical aspect of the film can be recognized by the absurdity of its narrative,
which was David Cronenberg's main intention, he exaggerated the relationship between
man and vehicle to the point of achieving sexual attraction, in order to comment on the
absurd addiction that people have with their machines and in particular how pornography
promotes unusual sexual fantasies.

B. The Fly (1986)

The second film in this subcategory and the last film in Chapter III is already
mentioned before, David Cronenberg's most popular film, The Fly. Although I have
analyzed this film before, there is one specific scene that I haven't mentioned yet and this
is the very last one. As I have already established, by the end of the film, Seth Brundle,
having now reached his complete metamorphosis, looks more like a fly than a human, but
to save himself he forces Ronnie into one of the two machines and himself in the other,
but Ronnie's boss saves her in time before the teleportation process is complete, resulting
in Seth merging with the machine itself. Once teleported, Seth leaves the machine
horribly fused with the metal door and wiring of the second machine and he begs Ronnie
to end his suffering. It's quite interesting, because not only is the film a general
documentation of a man's metamorphosis into a fly, but the very ending is quite literally
the merging of a man with a machine, in this case his own invention, in other words man
becomes the machine which could be the most symbolic representation so far in a film by
Cronenberg, of human dependence on the machine.
At the end of the film, Seth becomes one third man, one third fly and one third
machine and this is David Cronenberg's way of showing how a scientist becomes so
enamored with his own creation to the point of becoming it, a commentary on the fragile
nature of man in our society compared to the machines around us, from our cars to our
phones, we are always dependent on our technologies, yet another great representation of
the Videodrome slogan, "The New Flesh", since the machine indeed becomes part of
Seth's flesh.

Page !33 of 38
!
Page !34 of 38
!
 Conclusion

The genre of horror in cinema is fairly widely represented, from gothic, to found-
footage, to the supernatural, and even the psychological. However, no one has quite
revolutionized Body Horror like the master of the sub-genre, David Cronenberg.
Although his filmography does not only contain body horror films, his reputation stems
from his specialty in the sub-genre. In the case of a filmography so focused on a specific
style and theme, it is always interesting to ask where the influence and inspiration for
these works comes from, and in the case of Cronenberg, one notices large similarities
between his films and The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka. As many of the director's
films contain major themes of some type of metamorphosis, the similarities to the novel
are pretty obvious given its revealing title. To sum up, in the literary work, Franz Kafka,
paints the story of a young man who inexplicably transforms into an insect, and how this
metamorphosis affects him and those around him, which is literally the intrigue of the
David Cronenberg's best known film, The Fly, but this film is not the only one with
Kafkaesque quality, in fact David Cronenberg literally mentions the writer in other films
like in Naked Lunch and uses themes that are invoked in the novel, as the transformation
of the body, alienation and social commentary, through his filmography. Although,
looking at the director's filmography, we can recognize two different common threads
which then divide filmography into two distinct categories. The first category of films is
based on the narrative of the dehumanization of the human body, in other words, this
category contains a group of films with the common narrative of a protagonist who will
undergo bodily mutations after some scientific intervention. The three main films in this
category are Rabid, The Brood, and The Fly, and the common thread is David
Cronenberg's intention behind the dehumanization, which involves making a social
commentary on the dangers of modern science, in many scientific fields, such as the
medical field, the psychological field and the field of advanced physics. The second
category of films is based on the narrative of the humanization of inanimate objects,
literally and figuratively, in other words, this category contains a group of films with the
common narrative that an object, either representative of modern media or of a modern

Page !35 of 38
!
technological machine, is literally humanized, transforming into a living organism or
figuratively, being sexualized, a description which should only be given to humans. In
this category two subcategories can be identified, the first is two films with the similar
basic narrative of the humanization of a media object, in the first film, Videodrome, the
object is a television, and in the second film, Existenz, the object is a video game. These
modern media products are literally humanized, they really come alive, and this is David
Cronenberg's way of highlighting the great impact that media has on our society, and how
addicted we have become to it, to the point of letting it redefine our perception of reality.
In movies, this translates into a complete loss of control and identity of the characters
after being exposed to it. The second subcategory consists of two more films with also
some similar basic narrative, of the symbiotic relationship between man and machine, in
the first film, Crash, the machine in question is the car, while in the second film, The Fly,
the machine is the teleportation invention of Seth Brundle. In the case of Crash, a group
of underground people are sexually aroused by the event of a car accident and will try
anything and everything to fulfill their sexual fantasies even if it means death, this film is
a hyperbolic commentary satirical on the craze people have for their cars. In the case of
The Fly, the relationship between man and machine literally occurs at the end of the film
but is implied throughout the film, and it is Seth Brundle's attachment to his teleportation
machine, to the point of merging with it in the last scene of the film. It is important to
identify that these two categories of dehumanization of the living and humanization of the
non-living both make up the same metamorphosis story.
In conclusion, David Cronenberg earned his reputation in the body horror sub-
genre with great attention to detail in his work, especially in relation to Franz Kafka's
influence on his work, which raises the question of the rest of the influences and their
impact on his works, in particular, the influence of William S. Burroughs.

Page !36 of 38
!
 Filmography

Primary Corpus

CRONENBERG David, Rabid, Canada, Body Horror, 1977, 91 min.

CRONENBERG David, The Brood, Canada, Body Horror, 1979, 92 min.

CRONENBERG David, The Naked Lunch, Canada, Sci-Fi Horror, 1983, 89 min.

CRONENBERG David, Videodrome, Canada, Sci-Fi Horror, 1983, 89 min.

CRONENBERG David, The Fly, Canada, Sci-Fi Horror, 1986, 96 min.

CRONENBERG David, Crash, Canada, Thriller, 1996, 97 min.

CRONENBERG David, Existenz, Canada, Sci-Fi Thriller, 1999, 97 min.

Secondary Corpus

SCOTT Ridley, Alien, United States, Sci-Fi Horror, 1979, 117 min.

CRONENBERG David, Shivers, Canada, Sci-Fi Horror, 1975, 87 min.

CARPENTER John, The Thing, United States, Sci-Fi Horror, 1982, 109 min.

Page !37 of 38
!
 Bibliography

WILSON, Scott. Politics of Insects: David Cronenberg's Cinema of Confrontation.

Continuum. New York : Katie Gallof, 2011. 244p.

BEARD, William. The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg. University
of Toronto Press. Toronto : William Beard, 2006. 565p.

BERNOFSKY, Susan. The Metamorphosis: A New Translation by Susan Bernofsky. W.

W. Norton & Company. New York : 2013, 2013. 101p.

LOPEZ CRUZ, Ronald Allan. « Mutations and Metamorphoses: Body Horror is

Biological Horror ». Journal of Popular Film and Television , print.-December 2012 , n°
9-10, p. 160-168.

HOTCHKISS, Lia M. « Still in the Game: Cybertransformations of the "New Flesh" in

David Cronenberg's eXistenZ. » The Velvet Light Trap, vol. 52, 2003, p. 15-32. Project
MUSE, disponible sur : doi:10.1353/vlt.2003.0018 (consulté le 20 december 2020).

ZUBOSZEK, Mateusz. L’influence de la technologie sur le corps et l’esprit humains dans

les films de David Cronenberg. Spécialisation en philologie anglaise: Bielsko-Biała:
Université de technologie et de sciences humaines de Bielsko-Biała, Faculté des sciences
humaines: 2007. p. 37.

M. POMERANCE. « Neither Here Nor There: ExistenZ as "Elevator Film" ». Quarterly

Review of Film and Video, 20:1, 2003, p. 1-14, disponible sur : https:// doi.org/
10.1080/10509208.2003.10540504 (consulté le 1 janvier 2021).

Page !38 of 38
!