Shivers

I'm a big fan of the director's but had never seen this one until the other day (the VHS re-release "director's cut" or whatever). The other user comments had let me to expect an amateurish curiosity, but I found it polished and feel no need to make any excuses for it (perhaps the new release is a cleaner print).

It's pretty sly, the acting's not bad and I found the film most remarkable for its restraint and subtlety. I'm not sure I buy the idea that the parasites are a metaphor for Americanization - Cronenburg's concerns are, I think, more personal and abstract than such a reading gives him credit for.

The movie is deliberately paced and the shock/gore factor is relatively low. I found it to be a modest footnote in a career that later bore stranger, richer fruit.

In the fancy Starliner compound in an island near Montreal, a mad scientist tests a parasite in the body of his mistress. He believes that man is an animal that thinks too much, and he develops a parasite to increase the violence and sexual desire of mankind. There is an outbreak in the condominium, with the fierce dwellers becoming zombies of sex.

"Shivers" is the third feature of this great Canadian cult director David Cronenberg, indeed a very low budget trash movie, with a final cost of US$ 179.000,00. The story mixes humor and horror and the effects are very nasty and disgusting, a trademark of Cronenberg. The story is a kind of sexual version of "The Night of the Living Dead", with people turning out zombies of sex. The screenplay of 1979 "Alien" used many concepts of this movie. The interview of David Cronenberg in the DVD is excellent, and it is very funny to know that the actress Sue Patrick asked him to slap her face in the scenes that she needed to cry, and Barbara Steele reaction to this physical assault. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Calafrios" ("Shivers")

Cronenberg's variation on the Zombie theme was his first full length feature film and for this it is surprisingly good.

From the technical point of view, it is very amateurish. The lighting and camera work are highly reminiscent of home made Super 8, and the sound is bad beyond belief.

Although the mindless creatures attacking anything that moves immediately recall the Zombies, Cronenberg's movie has some original ideas. In fact, watching German television these days, the subject of bored middle class diving into sex orgies (at least in their fantasy) seems more up to date than ever. Unlike Romero's Zombies, Cronenberg's creatures simply embark into endless sexual excesses, including minors. Indeed, one of the most scandalous scene shows two young girls on dog leashes, climbing up a stair and barking - unexcusable image!

The special effects in "Shivers" work very well and are more slimy, organic, and visceral than say Romero's, and give better testimony of the vulnerability of the human body. They set the tone for Cronenberg's use of gore in his subsequent films.

"Shivers" earned Cronenberg immediately the title of the "reigning king of shlock horror" - very appropriate.

For me, the best of Cronenberg's earlier works is an exercise in claustrophobic tension building, wrapped in a concept of pure exploitation, and all further used as an excuse for a wicked Buñuelian-like satire on the woes of contemporary consumer culture and the antiseptic nature of modern living. The way that Cronenberg creates this world of gated purification turned into a beacon for the very best of late twentieth century existence, only to then pull the walls down from within as the characters are turned into dribbling, sex starved deviants is not only an effective horror-film scenario - drawing on the prevalent notions of isolation and paranoia usually found in films of this particular nature - but also as a comment on the vapid, overwhelming sense of boredom that modern life, with all its consumer fads and soulless pursuit of social fulfilment can present.

Like the very best of these retro exploitation films, Shivers (1975) works on at least two distinct levels of enjoyment and interpretation, with the obvious shocker elements suggesting an even more warped take on the territory of Night of the Living Dead (1968) - with sidelines into the same kind of atmosphere created by John Carpenter in his subsequent Assault of Precinct 13 (1976) - while the more personal and psychological aspects of the script complement the more recognisable elements of horror in a way that creates a perfect symbiosis between presentation and form. Admittedly, the look of the film and the obvious limitations of the low budget might disappoint some viewers more accustomed to glossier, 21st century thrillers; whilst the once shocking elements of the film might even seem somewhat quaint, especially in light of the veritable pornography of violence in films such as Saw III (2006), Hostel (2005) and The Hills Have Eyes (2006). Nonetheless, I think many viewers more familiar with horror/thriller/science-fiction cinema of this particular period will still be able to appreciate what Cronenberg was trying to achieve with this depiction of violence and depravity; with the scenes and scenarios - especially in the film's frenzied final act - really going for the jugular in terms of outré shock spectacle and the subversion of traditionally wholesome, all American iconography.

The idea of a small band of survivors coming together in the name of self-preservation as an inexplicable horror affects those closest to them is still a well worn concept in horror cinema, and one that works incredibly well when combined here with Cronenberg's cold, Kubrickian vision of a sterile, social environment as sex and death become distorted amidst moments of stock exploitation, sly wit and a genuinely subversive sense of satirical absurdity. Though it is admittedly rough around the edges and lacking in the obvious prestige of films like The Brood (1979) and Videodrome (1982), I'd still take this over A History of Violence (2005) or Eastern Promises (2007) any day; with Shivers standing out as not only one of Cronenberg's very best films, but one of the most unique, unconventional and completely engrossing exploitations works of this particular cinematic period.

The first big screen flick for Canadian horror master David Cronenberg was this skin-crawling B horror movie.

Residents of a high rise apartment building are being attacked by parasites that are turning them into crazed zombies with nothing but sexual assault on their minds!

Shivers is an effectively disturbing movie, not unlike most of Cronenberg's later horror classics. It's had a good hand in influencing later creature flicks. The story has a good premise and builds some terrific tension as it escalates to a great claustrophobic climax. What's clever about this movie is that most of the horror is suggested, we don't see the parasites much and their elusiveness just helps to create more tension. The makeup effects are decent for a low budgeter and the cast turn in some adequate performances, horror veteran Barbara Steele is a nice addition to the cast.

Shivers is a entertaining slice of B horror that manages to live up to its title well. A must-see for Cronenberg fans.

*** out of ****