temrok9

One should not expect a John Carpenter feeling here; still, some of the episodes are the best thing in horror I have encountered in recent years ( and I'm talking about movies too). Clear-focused, narrated with economy , and enjoyable all through. A very special ( and very good) piece of work in a time when everything is so alike.

It's interesting to see how uninvolved most people get while watching The Shrouds. This probably means they didn't get what it really was all about. Perhaps they prefer some simpler representatives of the so-called "body horror". Perhaps they never understood what Cronenberg's cinema stood for, at all( certainly not what A history of violence or Eastern promises delivered). Perhaps the most interesting and certainly one of the most enjoyable movies of this century so far, The Shrouds is a peculiar mix of black comedy, pynchonian paranoia, synthesis of other Cronenberg movies' themes ( especially Videodrome and Crash), and commentary on the demand for the Real through technology in our moden world. Not an easy philosophy to swallow, it seems, in a time of naive interpretations of what "meaning" can mean . So let The Substance rule, instead!

It's a mystery to me why Oshima, and especially his movie Ceremony ( although my personal favourite is Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence) doesn't get the recognition he deserves, among the greatest directors. Possibly because, apart for the famous In the realm of the senses, very few have watched his films. Ceremony, in my opinion, is his best film. It is extraordinary how he constructs the narration of this family saga, and how he makes it resonate with thoughts and feelings in every minute of it, putting in shame all of the more applauded asian family stories that became famous movies over the kast decades. But he also surpasses many acclaimed European directors of his time. Ceremony is an undisputed masterpiece that you watch shivering , a proof that cinema can be made out of pure magic!