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Since this movie's story is so lacking that it could be summed up in a couple of sentences, I'm only leaving a short review, because anything else I would find a waste of the reader's time.

This film is unnecessarily self-indulgent, pretentious and it tries too hard. It also doesn't help that it's way too long for what it has to offer. While it does keep your attention for a while, once you realize what it's about, it will become boring quickly.

I guess I'm in the minority here, but to me this is just artistry done not-right. It kind of reminds me of things I wrote during my film student years. The script is quite amateurish, even though most of the film is well executed, and the ending makes you either laugh or roll your eyes, because despite the movie not being too great at philosophy, it really tries to sell you on how deep and meaningful it is.

If you haven't seen many films with a deep and complex message, or if you are entertained by constant torture scenes, then you might enjoy this one. Sadly the good core idea couldn't save this movie for me.

This movie is one of Cronenberg's best, with The Fly and Videodrome being just as good (if not better). It's like a weird amalgamation of several of his movies, and many ideas that could have their own movies - and somehow it all works flawlessly.

This review might contain very slight spoilers (I'm only warning you, because this movie is worth going in completely blind), but if you only got this far, then go check out this movie! Hint: it's a classic, thought-provoking Cronenberg bodyhorror, and NOT a silly slasher or jumpscare-fest. Filmmaking-wise it's a good 7 out of 10.

Story: Crimes of the Future takes many dark concepts that make you think throughout the movie, if you are sensitive to ideas that at first seem distant from our experiences, but the more you think about them, the more they haunt you. One of such concepts is the loss of pain, which changes such an elemental part of human existence, that the future humanity portrayed in the movie starts seeking new ways to feel (it). Most of the story is about human evolution, and needless to say, the film takes some interesting twists and ideas, that it expands upon through its runtime. The movie uses performance art to express itself, but it never feels preachy or self-indulgent, rather it uses this tool pretty well to show the viewer what pain, pleasure and life means in this future. The story is slowly, but deliberately driven forward by events that naturally unfold in the movie, and the characters have complex, yet understandable motivations, which is really an achievement in this case, since a film full of strange, not always fully connected ideas could fall apart very quickly. The story unfolds naturally, and even when there are twists, it doesn't seem forced or out-of-character; it's all very organic. To me, this movie shows that this director can grow, because the more complex his ideas used to get, the more disconnected his movies were. I applaud Crimes for being able to handle this many separate thoughts, and making sense while still being complex.

Visuals and sound: The cinematography and visuals can make your hair stand up on your arm, and they portray the almost depressing future of the movie very well. This film doesn't have many locations, but I liked how coherent they all were, and never felt out-of place. CGI was barely used, and it didn't distract from what was happening, and the practical effects were almost always perfectly convincing (the one thing that looked a little off to me was the EatWare chair's arm, that looked to wobble slightly more than I would've imagined). The designes for the costumes, future-tech, and the world itself fit together well, and the whole movie had a nice flow to it visually, which means that nothing was out of place, but nothing was too bland either. Just like pretty much everything else, the editing also contributed a lot to this well-built world, by not disrupting the flow of the movie - being the glue to the story.

An important element of any movie are the sounds and the music, and I have to say, they both created an eerie atmosphere, which was a nice fit for the disturbing visuals. The sounds of the future-tech were very fitting to the boney-looking machines, and the music - while the movie didn't have many pieces - fit the world that was portrayed, and also the kind of 70's-80's horror cinema feel that the film had in places, which I really appreciated.

Pacing, acting: What most people seem to have a problem with, is the slow pacing of the movie - or maybe the feeling that the movie doesn't really get anywhere until the very end. I agree, that some scenes could have been probably a little shorter, however, I never felt that they were unnecessary or boring - but yes, I understand they are not perfect. I think this partly has to do with the fact that even when the film delivers a twist, the audience might not get very excited, due to the twist unfolding naturally, and the world being so detached from ours in many aspects. If you don't expect an "epic setup" for a twist, however, then you will keep enjoying the story without being disappointed. The majority of horror fans (and somehow these two words sound scarier to me than the entire movie) are used to flashy gore, jumpscares, spooky twists and high adrenaline. Well, this is everything BUT a conventional horror movie. The slow pace is deliberate, and our ever-shrinking attention span might be put to the test in some scenes. What's a bigger issue, however, is that at the end I felt like some of the sub-plots of the movie would've deserved more attention, and maybe even more of a conclusion, or at least an outcome, and not being cut in half. Yes, maybe I'm the first person to say it here, but I think this movie actually needed a bit MORE time. With some elements of the movie, them not being fully explored worked well, because it added to the subtlety of the world, but others really screamed for more discovery, that we never really got. What is in the movie though, works and flows well right until the very end.

The other major thing people seem to have a problem with is the acting. I wasn't completely satisfied with everyone's performance, but the main two delivered very believable, yet distant characters, who were honestly perfectly fitting for everything that was shown and told on the screen. You could make the case, that even the lesser performances were deliberate and fit the worl well, but I'm not going to go this far - let it be enough that every performance is at the very least acceptable.

Conclusion: Overall this movie surprised me. As I look around today's movie scene, I realize that there are little-to-none thought-provoking movies nowadays, and they rarely dare to stray far from the usual concepts and ideas that you've seen a hundred times already - even if you're not a cinephile. Crimes of the Future is not afraid to explore interesting thoughts, and from evolution to the question of what makes us human (and when do we stop being human) successfully asks a lot of questions, that are sure to linger in your mind after the haunting synth music hits its very last note at the end.