Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

Toronto-born auteur David Cronenberg has always been to me one of the greatest modern horror movie filmmakers to have ever been uttered with authority by fans of the genre. He remains in the eyes of many to be one of the most controversial directors today, a man whose ideas will either switch you on or yank your plug, but he has never shortchanged himself or his celluloid concepts. As a younger, less demanding movie fan, I just simply was wowed in by the violence quotient of his movies, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who was knocked into a loop the first time he/she saw "Scanners" and saw one character willed into having his head blown to smithereens. It was a disturbing, and to this day even well-done shock effect, and nearly every single Cronenberg film to date contains such an example of this type of gory creation.

But this paints Cronenberg into a corner, because many of his detractors simply look at his movies from face value. They see only the sadistic acts of violence or the mechanical sensuality or the splatter, and then they forget about the rest, the social metaphors, the mostly professional performances he gets from his cast, the long-lasting visual impact of scenes that went on to be reflected even in modern times, as Cronenberg himself has had what may be the uncomfortable position of having thought of certain themes that have manifested themselves into something big in the modern world. He admits himself that he's not a prophet, but he gets the visions in moments when he's using his imagination as a satellite, pulling down incidents from his personal life, meshing the dream-like situations in, and then applying some sort of logic to connect them all as he writes out a script. He's as much a visionary as people like Wes Craven and John Carpenter are, but he has drawn the most acclaim and the most distance over the course of his 30-year career (given if you look at his feature film career, and place his earlier efforts from 1969 and up on the backburner).

Nowadays, as a 20-year-old movie fan in diapers (and sporadic bursts of ideas I can't often remember), I welcome Cronenberg's work with open arms and an open mind, because I always expect his films to be art. Pure, unsoiled art. I hate building expectations about the collective work of one talent, but Cronenberg to me has always been consistent. And that is something to be admired. He has released 14 movies that have all been rated R or worse in this country, never buckling down to mainstream perceptions or letting the skewered decisions of censorship boards hinder his determination. And all of his movies seem to have some sort of richness to them, drawing from a wealth of notions on biological horror, diseases, and the corruption of flesh by outside forces. Whether you are appalled or acceptable of what Cronenberg is doing in his movies, they linger in your collective subconsciousness, and you never seem to take them for granted now matter how many times you watch them, which is to me what makes Cronenberg's work so potent. You could watch his movies many and many times, but find something new, some unseen perception or thought, which eluded you before.

If any of his earliest movies could be branded with such an unpredictable magnetism, it's his 1982 movie VIDEODROME (Universal Pictures; unrated, containing explicit graphic violence and metaphorical images, scenes of torture, strong sexuality/nudity, and some language; 89 minutes; released on February 4, 1983). Hot off the heels of his Stateside breakthrough via "Scanners," the writer/director crafted a postmodern meditation on his favorite subject: how the flesh and bone turns into something rotten, something abnormal, and the ways which the body can become a weapon. Cronenberg was deeply inspired by the independent Toronto cable station City TV, a community-based station which would air soft core porn movies on a nightly basis, as well as the backlash of many against the violence quotient of his films and the philosophies & personality of the late media mogul Marshall McLuhan. McLuhan himself was once a teacher at the University of Toronto, where Cronenberg attented, and to this day Cronenberg regrets that he never enrolled in any of his classes.

James Woods wasn't the most popular actor in 1982, and he wouldn't really win a whole lot of respect until he got an Oscar-nominated turn in Oliver Stone's "Salvador" a few years later. But even in 1982, and even in 1979, if you count his arresting role in "The Onion Field," James Woods was a powerhouse performer, and he deserves as much respect as possible for placing his faith in Cronenberg's mind-corroding thoughts and providing his own interesting take on the lead character, who indeed occupies about 98% of this motion picture. Woods is Max Renn, owner of Civic TV in a small Canadian community. This is a cable station that specializes in providing viewers with their own brand of "Baby Blue Movies" (the explicit material the real life City TV would play), in the forms of hardcore violence and softcore pornography. Max feels as if he's just providing an outlet for the inner desires of man, when he indeed is the one manifesting his desires into the TV. After watching a Japanese program wherein a woman pleasures herself with a wooden phallus, he concludes to his business partners that he wants "something that'll break through, something...tough." He finds it when in the form of "Videodrome."

Cronenberg admits in the commentary track for this Criterion Collection release that he, as a kid, would once fiddle with the antenna on his TV set late at night when the major stations were down, and pick up strange interceptions from smaller networks which displayed some rather unnerving after hours programming. He decided to have Max Renn stumble upon "Videodrome" via satellite, after his cyber-hacker assistant Harlan (Peter Dvorsky) pirates a small amount of static-ridden footage of "Videodrome" he deduces is from Malaysia. Max sees it for the first time and is immediately in awe at the program's content, a disturbingly realistic depiction of people being dragged into an orange room by masked barbarians and being tortured and eventually killed on-screen. There's no story, no development, no production cost or slick photography. It's like "reality snuff TV." Max asks Harlan to keep intercepting transmissions of "Videodrome," and eventually Harlan realizes that the broadcast is coming from Pittsburgh.

Max, in the meantime, starts to develop personal connections with a woman named Nicki Brand, played in a debut role by a ginger-haired Deborah Harry, who spends her time offering on-air counseling for a radio program. He invites her to her apartment complex and she decides to settle for some porn, but curiously pops the tape of "Videodrome" into his VCR. She herself feels possessed by this show, as Brand is a fulfilled masochist who has been over stimulated and thus turns to self-mutilation to feel any small semblance of excitement. In fact, Max and Nicki lie naked in front of the TV and have a rather interesting sex scene where he manually pierces Nicki's ear and he tastes her blood (hear Cronenberg's commentary for some more autobiographical inspiration), hinting that he indeed has some carnal desires relating to the marriage of sensuality and sadism. And this moment also proves the first instance when "Videodrome" starts to etch it way into Max's mind, as he envisions him and Nicki making out on the set of "Videodrome."

As Max becomes deeply interested in investing "Videodrome" to the viewing public, and the seductively self-destructive Nicki herself goes to Pittsburgh in order to seek out a role on the show, the effects of "Videodrome" starts to take effect on Max. Although he is warned by a friendly program commissioner named Masha (Lynne Gorman) that the show is dangerous because it indeed has a "philosophy," Max wants that show's origins more than ever, and his reality becomes blurred as a result of overexposure to the show. He starts suffering from massive headaches. He finds a handgun in his possession. He seeks out the media mogul Brian O'Blivion (Jake Creley) but only finds his daughter Blanca (Sonja Smits), who provides Max a videocassette in order to help him clear out why he's starting to trip out like he does. Max listens to Brian explain that "Videodrome" carries a neurosis-altering signal that was responsible for a malignant tumor in his brain, but he finalizes that this is not merely a tumor, but a new type of uncontrolled flesh that has developed. Max imagines the murder of Brian before his eyes by one of the leather-clad "Videodrome" psychopaths, who turns out to be Nicki. What happens in that moment is a scene that I want you to see for yourself if you are new to this movie. Just take the still that appears on the cover of this DVD as a taste of how weird this movie gets.

But even then, Cronenberg pushes you further along the hellish road of physical monstrousness by showing Max's stomach as to contain its own new sexual organ, one he inserts his gun into but eventually loses inside his body. Max also encounters a man named Barry Convex (Les Carlson), who is the head of the CONSEC defense corporation, the owner of an eyeglass chain "Spectacular Optical," and a man who turns out to be the one who purposefully introduced Max to the "Videodrome" signal. This shady man uses his own videotape for insertion into Max's abdominal hole, and programs him to become an assassin for his scheme to transmit "Videodrome" worldwide through Max's Channel 83. But on the opposite side is Bianca, who instructs our hero to fight back using the video flesh that was spawned on him.

Many people have undoubtedly linked VIDEODROME to the "cyberpunk" movement, which was what the whole marketing campaign for this movie touted it as. And indeed if you look at it through this literary vein, you'll find a highly sexualized variant on the style. Cronenberg himself plays with alternating ideas of hardware and software, such as when Max starts to envision his beta cassettes as being moaning, pulsating objects just meant to be taken in through open crevices. It's a very powerful moment indeed, but indeed not exactly cyberpunkish. Cronenberg indeed utilizes video and television as factors in the changes Max undergoes and as factors into the real world Max occupies, in a world where technology becomes more than simply items of electricity but of flesh and form. I neglected to mention one scene where Max sees Nicki on his TV set, but this is the centerpiece of the movie and the point in the movie where you'll either get sickened to the point where you'll shut the movie off on a whim, or you'll get the gist of what Cronenberg is saying in this movie. People looking for some foreshadowing clues in the evolution of interactive media will get a queasy kick out of this scene, regardless.

Television becomes the new religion in Max's world, and its preacher is the aptly named Brian O'Blivion. Brian has refused to appear in any other form but than on the televised monitor, as we see him conversing with Max and Nicki at the moment they meet. He indeed is structured on the foundations of Marshall "the medium is the message" McLuhan, and he indeed becomes somewhat more of a willing prophet than Mr. Cronenberg. "The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye," he says at one particular point, and it indeed resonates as you watch this movie. Even as we see Max losing his grip on the real world and the TV world as his body begins to adapt to this "new flesh" which comes along, we sense the power of O'Blivion in the outside world, as his Cathode Ray Mission building is a shelter for homeless people, yet it doesn't provide soup and shelter, but TV monitors as a means of bringing them into society, or as Bianca puts it, to "patch them back into the world's mixing board." But even then, Brian probably never anticipated that he would be the first victim of "Videodrome," and we are convinced that his side is the most morally balanced, whereas Convex is simply megalomaniacal and interested in dominating the world with Brian's powerful signal. They indeed suffer in the end, as Bianca and the tele-visual presence of Nicki motivate Max to his destiny, as "the video word made flesh" responsible for fulfilling the prophecy of the "new flesh."

Another intriguing aspect I found about Cronenberg's movie was that he attempts to subtly toy with the notion that violence and sexuality on TV manifest itself in the real world. Indeed, the program "Videodrome" does such that, which eventually means that David Cronenberg is drawing fire onto himself. But then he creates the conspiracy, and ties the video signal to the actions of the shady entrepreneur who INTENDS to have this aired around to everyone who watches it, and to turn it into the catalyst for domination. Thus, he ends up tossing the accusations in the face of the critics and soldiers on with enough plasma to make Dracula the size of Ruben Studdard.

Of course, talking about VIDEODROME, I wouldn't want to neglect the sheer force of the makeup FX. I don't want to give any of these moments away because the element of surprise (or anticipation) works well in a movie such as this. Scenes that could easily be accomplished today via computer effects required three months of intense planning and execution by the great Rick Baker, who won the first Oscar for make-up effects with "An American Werewolf In London," and his crew. The result still intensifies even to this day. The Criterion DVD explains how the process of each elaborate effect was accomplished, and the results are something of grotesque splendor. Cronenberg himself only utilizes gore not as a gratuity, but as a way of enforcing what his themes are. However, to be frank, this movie is absolutely bloody and stomach-churning in many moments. Like when Darryl Revok and Cameron Vale were engaging in the most visceral telepathic showdown at the end of "Scanners," this one spills plenty of red in its final act, the moment Max becomes equipped with his new "flesh gun" and seeks to deliver Civic TV to the enemy. I want to save how Harlan and Convex bite the dust for the most virginal viewer, but let me just say that if you don't cringe once during these moments, maybe you've been over-stimulated too.

Cronenberg, as always, remains drab on visuals and constantly avoids having a whole lot of widescreen visual tricks (he also says on this DVD that he shoots his movies so that they would look good even if pan & scanned). Aside from that, Cronenberg has a natural eye for setting up evocative images, using colors and schemes to their most visually dynamic and having a lot of nice darkness bask upon many shots in the film so that we can focus on what we do see in terms of lighting and action. Also, in true "WTF" fashion, he grounds the hallucinations in real life so that you, like Max, can't be sure of yourself of what's real and what's imaginary. There's no blurriness or faded colors to convince you otherwise. He also develops a lot of respect to his characters, perhaps more so than he did in any previous film before, and setting himself up for the dramatic impact future movies like "The Dead Zone," "The Fly" and "Dead Ringers" would embody later in the 1980s.

However, one must give respect to the actors as well. David Cronenberg's script for this one (which at the time didn't have a completed ending) must have narrowed down who the most brave performers were at the time. James Woods is an eloquent, compelling, and brave performer, and that he's so true to the movie even in the most outlandish moments makes you certain that this is a more respectable enterprise than most give it credit for. Max Renn is not to be chastised for his business decision to go forward with "Videodrome," but has a sort of mix of unawakened voyeurism and unprincipled decisiveness that makes his fate sealed. Renn is stuck in his own little noir where both his identity and his involvement with outsiders are shadowy and uncertain. He is the human heart and soul of this movie, even as the mechanical metamorphosis proceeds, and Woods never showboats or takes the character to over-the-top realms that would've harmed the movie in any form. Pop star Debbie Harry just simply gets by on her presence, but she herself has to remain faithful to the personality of Nicki Brand, and she does that well. She is a person who indeed has the droll appeal to make a character like Nicki stick, as she indeed has the courage to undergo such jaw-dropping scenes as where Nicki "brands" her breast with a lit cigarette. It's true to her character: Nicki lives in an "excited state of over-stimulation" and sees "Videodrome" as the perfect drug, much better than burns or razorblade wounds (the "Nicki" part in her name). The supporting cast have shades in and of themselves that are of dual nature, particularly Peter Dvorsky as Harlan, who seems to be some sort of techno nerd as we watch him in the first half of the movie but ends up concealing a hidden agenda. I wasn't even sure which side of the bread the O'Blivions' butter was on when I first saw it, but I myself appreciated the work of both Sonja Smits and Jack Creley throughout.

Obligatory trivia note: In a scene where Barry gives Max an electronic helmet that senses hallucinations, James Woods was scared that the glowing contraption would malfunction on his head and fry him. So a certain Canadian director made his acting debut in one small 10-second sequence of VIDEODROME, before he starred in such movies as "Extreme Measures" and "Nightbreed." Can you guess?

David Cronenberg has always made movies on the side of the human being, but is concerned and fascinated with the ways flesh can be corrupted and transmogrified because of its frailty. Proving that he's more science fiction oriented than into cheap horror, which separates him from a handful of directors whose hack work was limited to cheap slasher movies, Cronenberg proves a fascinating story of the machine damning the mankind that created it, and not the other way around. The way video and many other forms of technology interfaces with man is something with which movies like "The Matrix" and even later Cronenberg films like "The Fly" and "ExistenZ" seem to have been heavily influenced by over the years. And if you think of "reality TV" as something merely seen on CBS, MTV and Fox, I dare you to watch VIDEODROME in its entirety and see if you don't have a brand new opinion on what exactly "reality TV" is, and where and if possible one can draw the line. Come to VIDEODROME expecting black humor, blue pornography and red liquids, but stay for the powerful shade of gray which makes this movie easily one of the very best conceptual sci-fi/horror films of the 1980s.

It was also one of the most interesting movies ever to have been submitted to a ratings board in that decade. It's hard to get across how much artistry Cronenberg paints in his images of sex and violence, whereas a smattering of horror movies in the decade have been offering the kind of gratuitous cheap thrills and sensual content meant to lure in a built-in audience. In fact, in the extra "Take One:Fear on Film," which I will talk about later on, Cronenberg brilliantly speaks in his usual soft-voiced manner on how he attempts to discern his movies in merit from the by-the-book gore movies of the past several years. And there is one point in the commentary where Cronenberg once and for all exposes the MPAA for all the half-assed decisions they make in enforcing the categorization of many movies (go to the scene where Max and Nicki have their first "date"). MCA/Universal Home Entertainment had previously released a DVD/VHS version of VIDEODROME which was the preferred rating-free 89 minute version. The sexuality and splatter were finally restored to David's artistic blessing, as well as a shot in the "Samurai Dreams" video clip of a lumber-crafted penis that was cut at the insistence of Universal head Bob Remy.

Criterion have released two past Cronenberg titles on special edition DVD, with "Dead Ringers" and "Naked Lunch." But VIDEODROME, presented for the first time in an anamorphic 1.85:1 aspect ratio picture, is the biggest treat for Cronenberg fans, starting off with the picture quality. Over 20 years after it was completed, you'd never guess that this film would've shown a lot of horrible age remnants from the work done on this print. As far as I could tell, the expected grain and only a teensy amount of dirt were the only real concerns with this transfer. There's no artifacting, haloing, or bleeding in any part of this movie, whilst detail and sharpness have never been better on this film. I was never taken out of the film for an instance by any blurry shots, edge enhancement, or print flaws, and that is worth more than something for a 1980s movie. Meanwhile, the color level has finally tightened and displays a lot of rich, accurate dimensions which were hard to unearth before. The lighting often displays a lot of brilliant tinting and there's many elaborate computer/video effects, and this gorgeous hi-def digital print does both aspects justice. Blackness and shadow detail, also prominent fixtures in how this movie was shot, also benefit from the most faithful presentation ever committed to this movie. I shouldn't want to tell you any more other than that you'll simply flip after you see just how much the whole restoration process buffered in the long run.

The audio is presented only in original Dolby Digital 1.0 monaural, but the mix doesn't truly disappoint other than the fact that the age truly factors in on this particular aspect. The majority of this movie centers on the frontal center speaker, which presents a dated, but highly serviceable mix boasting a lot of fidelity for such a limited soundscape. Dialogue is always clear, if at times highly processed through ADR recording, but the overall quality of the speech was never rough or straining. Effects had a rather quaint drive to them, as the frontal side speakers never contributed a whole of punch to the sounds of explosions and gunshots around the more energetic third act. The music score by Howard Shore could've sounded truly awesome given a new stereo remix, but eventually does well in this mono track. Finally, I felt small traces of low-end at moments via the throbbing electronics of Shore's compositions, but nothing too earth-shaking. Fans of the film will be won over by the picture, but considerably less proud of the sound mix, yet there's not much to expect from a mono soundtrack and I was somehow pleasantly surprised by how well this movie sounded anyway.

Now here is where the $39.95 SRP really starts to get worth every penny in value. Starting off we have a pair of audio commentary tracks, the first with David Cronenberg and cinematographer Mark Irwin, both recorded separately and edited together for this piece. With less than half of this commentary track devoted to him, Irwin has mostly a lot to say about working with the cast and crew as well as the technical details of the film, including a lot of the maddening lighting decisions used in many of the sequences. For instance, getting the glow of the TV set in the sex scene was a tough challenge, and working around many of the stellar video effects sequences also proved a no easy feat. However, David Cronenberg is the dominant speaker of this piece, being the creative master behind this film, and if you've ever had the chance to hear him in an interview or in a previous commentary track, you'd know that Cronenberg is very detailed in explaining his inspirations, his ideas, and the working situations from pre-production and beyond. And indeed Cronenberg talks a lot, in his usual drone-like but always lively and provocative voice, on everything from the script that was never finished to his reactions towards the modern evolution into Cronenberg's themes to small little bits of trivia and humor (when Barry slips a cassette into Max's little slit, Cronenberg gets the best single line in any commentary track of a 2004 movie). He even talks at length about the hypocrisy of this movie's censorship struggles and the negative reaction at test screenings from many who wrote "I hate your f-cking movie!" Even though I could've once dismissed Mr. Cronenberg, I can't now, and I can't dismiss this as being one of the year's most respectable audio tracks due in a large part to how well Cronenberg asserts himself towards remembering this movie.

The second track is a similar cut-and-paste pastiche of newly recorded sound bites from actors James Woods and Deborah Harry. Once again, as happened to Mr. Irwin on the last track, Debbie is given small doses scattered throughout this track where she truly offers compelling and lovely information about how Cronenberg got her involved in the film, the difference between her Blondie personality and the Nicki character, a quandary concerning whether or not Nicki is indeed a real character, her ability to perform a sex scene despite thinking she didn't have a perfect body, and other personal observations about David's ideas and his collective work. James Woods offers the most presence, and his comments and thoughts come flying at you fast and furiously. Woods is one of the most intelligent and knowledgeable actors of our time, as evidenced by the way he goes about this commentary track richly linking the film to pop culture, philosophy, modern civilization and other such topics with deft precision and an often explorative, deep-minded accuracy. He name drops McLuhan, Phillip K. Dick, Woody Allen, and many more in how he perceives David's themes and the movie's narrative. He also, like Cronenberg, has a nice sense of humor that makes him seem less like a rambler and more of a generally outstanding speaker. After hearing both Cronenberg and Woods deliver priceless comments on these tracks, I kept hoping there was an easter egg involving a newly recorded interview with these two men, because then this would've been easily the single most stellar DVD release of the year, even more so than any "Star Wars" trilogy or "Passion of the Christ"/Fahrenheit 9/11 single-disc catalog title.

The only remaining supplement on the first disc is Camera, a short 6-minute film David Cronenberg scripted and lensed in 2000 exclusively for display at the Toronto International Film Festival, which was celebrating its 25th year in operation. Les "Barry Convex" Carlson returns in this particular mini-movie as an actor who delivers a monologue concerning how unsettled he was at the arrival of 35mm camera into his glimpse, and the parallels between capturing imagery and escaping mortality. The movie was shot in digital video for the most part, as we see the kids fixing the old film camera, the actor focusing in on David's digital photography, and the children grooming the elder statesman for his moment in the camera. This is Cronenberg at his most restrained and his briefest, but even then the movie was shot with the participation of many of Cronenberg's familiar partners, such as composer Howard Shore and editor Ronald Saunders. This is a brilliant addition to the DVD.

Disc two is affectionately titled "The Supplements" in true Criterion fashion. We begin with the all-new 30 minute documentary Forging the New Flesh and the audio-only Effects Men, two bonus features containing newly-recorded comments by Rick Baker and documentary director Michael Lennick, a man who was supposed to join simply to create an effect of a TV emerging from a bathtub (which was eventually discarded) but was responsible for 72 pivotal shots of video effects in the movie. Most of the movie's FX crew agreed to speak for this track, whilst interviews with Cronenberg and Woods are taken from a 1981 promo feature which appears later in the DVD. To sum it all up, you'd be damned just how they got a TV set to pulsate and flex the way they did, as well making effects of exploding innards-filled boob tubes and the "cancer gun" in action, but they made it happen, and those loyal Fangoria fanatics who love the inside scoop on how these grisly but unbelievably concise effects were created around the "golden age of special effects." That said period in time is exactly what Rick Baker talks about in the expansive "Effects Men," in which he and Lennick share thoughts on a large array of topics, from FX creation to the collaborative method to their thoughts on both the professionalism of James Woods and the ideas of David Cronenberg. This is a rather informative piece that only lasts a brief time, which is sad, because this would've amounted to a great third audio commentary had there have been more of the principals speaking alongside them. Both men in particular still have a deep respect for this movie, and that they talk so candidly about their work (Baker explains in a fascinating manner his thoughts on not becoming a Hollywood director) proves it so for the duration of this clip. Fans will also learn about the infamous alternate ending for this movie, where the new flesh spawned creates a bizarre orgy between the main characters.

Bootleg Video is a menu which contains a trio of material shot outside of the movie, but which ended up being used in the movie on video monitors and in fantasy sequences. "All vestiges of the Videodrome signal have been removed for tumor-free viewing," it says in text for the introduction to the Transmissions From Videodrome section, which presents about five minutes of footage used for the "Videodrome" segments, including a couple of throwaway shots (for instance, the woman from "Samurai Dreams" is strangled in the torture chamber). Speaking of which, we also get the unedited, uncensored 13th episode of Samurai Dreams, as well as 5 minutes of Helmet-Cam test sequences where the camera tweaks colors and contrast on the same shot of Deborah Harry approaching Max with the black whip. The "Transmissions" section is presented only with commentary by Irwin and Lennick, whilst "Samurai Dreams" allows you the option of hearing the silent product, or one of two commentary tracks with Irwin & Lennick or Cronenberg, who once again gets a few parting shots at both the studio and the ratings board. Finally, you can watch the "Helmet-Cam" footage without sound or with brief commentary by Lennick & Irwin.

Fear on Film is a half-hour panel discussion featurette hosted by Mick Garris and recorded in 1982 for Universal basically as promotional fluff for the upcoming summer horror films "The Thing" and VIDEODROME (which actually came out in the winter). Garris interviewed John Landis ("An American Werewolf In London"), John Carpenter (Halloween), and David Cronenberg about such topics as their involvement and thoughts on modern horror filmmaking, issues of sex & violence, censorship, and test screenings. With the exception of the grizzled Carpenter, who seems stuck in middle both in placement and in opinion as Landis and Cronenberg talk, the previous two filmmakers are witty, detailed and active personalities who complement each other well. For instance, when Landis refers the decision to edit a brief snippet of porn movie footage (from his own "Kentucky Fried Movie") in his "Werewolf" as part of the MPAA's reflecting "the current morass of the times," Cronenberg decides to "amplify" that perspective by talking about the stringent policies of Ontario, where the Canadian film board sees the movie first, cuts out what they want, and hands you back your movie for worldwide distribution, and any attempt to restore what was originally cut back into your movie results in two years of prison time. In a way, despite the placement of clips from Carpenter's "The Thing" and Landis' "Werewolf," it's ultimately the profound, quaint Cronenberg who steals the show.

The menu titled Marketing contains a wide assortment of promotional materials. Garris was on hand to create the EPK feature The Making of VIDEODROME, in which a load of behind-the-scenes footage as well as some early interviews from Cronenberg, Baker, Woods and Harry provide enough small value of thoughtful commentary to enjoy for several minutes. I yearn for these type of subdued promotional materials where the commentary stretches outside talking about the plot and how swell everyone is. A trio of theatrical trailers are also featured, including one teaser in fullscreen and two full-length non-anamorphic widescreen trailers using some of the most hideous, laughable Commodore 64 visual images ever seen in a theatrical trailer. All I kept thinking as I watched these were that this movie was being aimed towards the MTV crowd, and in truth that just isn't so. I wasn't surprised this unfortunate movie died in the box office the way it did when these lame advertisements did so little to promote the film as it should have been. The section also contains a 53-slide marketing gallery and 25 publicity stills, the latter including shots of the actors taken from cut footage.

Finally, disc two concludes with the Still Galleries menu, which contains over 150 slides related to FX work and about 76 more from on the set which covers the cast and crew, from Cronenberg on down to makeup FX artist Steve Johnson. Inside the Beta VHS hardshell cover lies a 40-page color insert containing a list of chapter titles, movie/DVD credits, plenty of photos (I loved the one with Cronenberg and the flesh gun), and some text essays. Carrie Rickey of the Philadelphia Inquirer updates upon an article she first issued in the Village Voice around the 1983 theatrical release of the movie, delving deeper into Cronenberg's history, how he has proved himself in the eyes of filmmakers like John Carpenter and even Martin Scorsese, and also provides back-up for Cronenberg's "body conscious" thematic elements ("Far from advocating repression, Cronenberg movies argue that the revolution begins at home-right in our central nervous systems and psyches"). Cultural critic Gary Indiana has a smaller but equally passionate essay about the impact of this particular film, whereas Tim Lucas provides an all-out detailed description of the movie's long-winding history which, as noted, is presented in a more extensive version on the official Criterion website.

It should be pointed out that Cronenberg, who must be adamant about the way his movies look in the end, decided not to opt for this version to contain any of the infamous deleted scenes or TV-only footage which are glimpsed at via the photo galleries. In other words, I have to hold on to the composite VHS print of the movie I purchased online just so I can be more complete with the DVD than it could've possibly turned out.

I've said enough about VIDEODROME, and I'm sure that if you've read this review up till now, you might definitely be curious in picking up this particular DVD. I'll say it right now: do it! This is easily one of the best packages in the history of Criterion, boasting one of the most amazing digital transfers of a classic movie and a wealth of bells and whistles that dissect the movie from basically every possible angle. It isn't exactly the kind of movie that entertains on a massive scale (in 1983, Roger Ebert dubbed this "one of the least entertaining movies ever made," and this is from the same man who flip-flopped his opinion on Vincent Gallo's "The Brown Bunny"), but, as Cronenberg explains in the brief "Making of VIDEODROME" short, is one that will have you "entertaining his ideas." And that is what separates full-fledged art from amateurish pretension. I hate to end a review as grand as this with someone else's comment, but I feel it correct for this review to restate what Tim Lucas writes in this DVD: "In today's post-VIDEODROME cinema, anything is possible. But cinema without David Cronenberg is unimaginable."

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Good for Groups
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age