The Fly

by | Jan 17, 2015 | The Horror Review News | 0 comments

“To me, the mind is physical, the mind is the body. Without body there is no mind; there is nothing left of us when our bodies are dead, as far as I’m concerned. That’s it. So I’m a complete atheist for one thing and kind of an existentialist as well, so I don’t really separate the two. I think of most religions as being attempts to avoid the reality of the body because if you accept the body as our only reality, then your accept mortality as well–you accept death–and that’s a very difficult thing for people to do. A lot of art, culture, politics, and philosophy, in my opinion, are attempts to evade that reality.” –David Cronenberg

Alfred Hitchcock once told François Truffaut that he would never adapt a masterpiece to film. Using Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment as his example, the American filmmaker goes on to state that, by merely shifting its format, the potency of any work of genius would be lessened by default. Instead, the Master of Suspense took narratives which contained an interesting idea that unfortunately hadn’t been executed as well as it might have been and retold the tale in his own fashion. Likewise, Kurt Neumann’s 1958 sci-fi adventure, The Fly, had a lot to improve upon and, astutely, David Cronenberg chose to tap the B-production for a remake, to dauntingly masterful effect.

Nobel Prize nominee Seth Brundle (Jeff Goldblum) coerces Particle Magazine reporter, Veronica “Ronnie” Quaife (Geena Davis), to conduct an exposé upon his six-year research project, a teleporter. However, the devise will only successfully disintegrate and reintegrate inorganic matter while refusing to transport organic life. After an epiphany, Seth corrects the machine’s flaw yet, shortly thereafter, foolishly experiments upon himself during a bout of jealous rage after the discovery that Ronnie’s editor, Stathis Borans (John Getz), is her ex-boyfriend. Catastrophe follows after Seth bases his newfound confidence and stamina upon his impromptu teleportation only to later find that his subsequent deterioration is due to a fly having been bound alongside him in the telepod. A race ensues as Seth attempts to find a cure before his metamorphosis completes its cycle.

In many respects, The Fly is the perfect vehicle for a Cronenberg remake. The narrative’s apprehension of technology runs concurrent with the director’s trademark fascination with said motif. However, the tale, in its Beckettian sparsity, is an odd choice for the Canadian filmmaker whose canon had previously been chockfull of various personages and locales. Equally perplexing is that the work is, in many respects, as much Cronenberg’s version of George Langelaan’s titular 1957 short story as it is the auteur’s rendition of Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame. With an oeuvre which all but prohibits any semblance of love, Cronenberg’s The Fly is, at heart, one of the most tragic love stories ever set to film. Yet, fans of the filmmaker need not worry for the climax, in order to garner and generate a ripping of the audience’s heartstrings, must–as Cronenberg protocol demands–refuse to placate viewer expectation.

With the aide of Howard Shore’s epic soundtrack, whose intensity harps of Danny Elman’s prize moments (ironic in that Tim Burton was purportedly the original choice to direct) as–moreso than any score in recent memory–it implements silence to a stunningly masterful degree, Cronenberg presents his first series of rotund, complete, and (surprisingly, given the director) humane characters. Not only is bug-eyed actor Jeff Goldblum perfectly cast, Seth’s idiosyncrasies are brought to the forefront in a performance which many state well-deserved an Oscar nomination.

When a story is permitted a life of its own (as opposed to being forced by ideology), it inherits the complexities of the world writ large and, as such, is subsequently–like life–able to host a multitude of interpretations. Thus, The Fly can be viewed as being a parable of drug addition, adolescence, and AIDS, among others. With the former, we watch as Seth experiences a grandiose high after his initial teleportation before succumbing to physical and mental dilapidation. Goldblum’s character can even be heard complaining to Ronnie, “You’ll do anything to bring me down.” Likewise, the introverted, sexually vestal scientist–having finally encountered titillating stimuli in the guise of an attractive female journalist–much like his invention, after becoming familiar with “the flesh,” becomes rampant. His sex drive increases to an animalistic degree as, natch, he begins suffering from a deteriorating complexion as a newfound fascination with his body manifests itself. Sardonically, Seth’s preliminary realization that his body is changing occurs when he squeezes his rotting finger (a symbolic penis), only to have it, pimple-like, ejaculate white pus onto the mirror before him. Moreover, the motive for Seth foolishly electing to enter the teleport–something which Neumann’s original amateurishly overlooked–is, put simply, exaggerated jealousy sponsored by teen-level social and romantic inexperience. Finally, the storyline also supports Seth’s dilemma as being one of symbolic disease, especially in the form of AIDS. After having sex, the main character’s metaphorical penis harbors a malformation for, though still functioning, it nonetheless espouses pus which, to few audience members’ surprise, such culminates in the demise of its host. Furthermore, Chris Walas, the individual responsible for the production’s Academy Award-winning makeup, studied texts upon disease in preparation for the film.

However, the director personally lends another reading of the work in his refutation of the latter interpretation as he consequently implies that yet another theme is present. Cronenberg openly states that disease is a theme, but not disease proper. Rather, “the disease of being infinite” is the idea which Cronenberg cites as being key. As such, Seth experiences hyperactive decomposition, its many forms resembling the natural corrosion spurred on by the aging process as hair and teeth are lost, skin develops liver spot-like effects, walking is only possible with the aide of a cane, and fluid speech and thought become exacerbated. Hence, and not since Scanners five years prior, the director’s admitted atheism evidences itself once again. As with Neumann’s original, not only do we have a machine which proves that the mind and body are both comprised of physical matter (an atheistic mantra), such a notion is reinforced by Seth’s telepods being able to disintegrate and then, not reintegrate (for such–by definition–would be impossible) but reproduce (Seth’s exact term) the original subject. Interestingly, the mad scientist’s megalomania and parallel God Complex which fascinated as much as it repulsed audiences during the Golden Age of Hollywood is once again, however subtly, brought back to the Big Screen in what is perhaps the most subversive film since James Whale’s Bride of Frankenstein.

As with life, The Fly cannot escape Freudian criticism. Almost ironically given how easily the story lends itself to such a reading, Cronenberg inverts gender roles in that–unlike in the original cinematic rendition of the tale–after justification is given for Seth’s desire to invent such a devise (due to his motion sickness), we watch as the scientist is presented as a stay-at-home mom. As a creator, the genius’s maternal instinct manifests itself in egg-like devises which will later allow its maker to be “reborn” (the key phrase here being the root word of the previous term). Furthermore, Veronia goes by a male nickname, “Ronnie,” as she periodically departs from the home from which Seth works in order to maintain her full-time career. Also, retaining a late 19th, early 20th-century interpretative sensibility, Cronenberg’s election to title his main character “Seth,” the name of the first son of Adam and Eve after Abel’s demise and thus the beginning of a new, hopefully better, race, hints at Friedrich Nietzsche’s Ubermensch while, crushingly, Geena Davis’s character remains true to her etymological, literary foundations as the woman who wiped the perspiration from Christ’s face as he bore the burden of the Cross as he, much like Seth, attempted to improve the lot of humanity.

However, for all of the film’s girth, even Cronenberg is unable to evade the problems of his predecessor in respect to scientific plausibility found within the narrative. The Fly never pauses to legitimize how the teleporter is able to distinguish between Ronnie’s inorganic panty hose and the organic bacteria which inevitably resided alongside it in the telepod (indeed a problem given the premise’s key dilemma) as, surprisingly, the idea that the devise enacts molecular, as opposed to atomic, “decimation,” is erroneously retained as well.

Irrefutably a masterpiece, David Cronenberg’s The Fly is one of the few instances in which a remake usurps its forerunner. By merely permitting his tale to naturalistically unravel, the Canadian auteur creates a story in which the perplexities of the world relocate themselves into a tightly-woven two hours and, much like life, the director refuses to cheat his audience for, whether we like it or not, the consequences of what follows, in a truly existential manner, just are and that’s what, in many respects, makes the work one of the most admirable films ever set to celluloid.

Trivia tidbit: The production was produced by Mel Brooks. No stranger to the bizarre tale after having sponsored David Lynch’s The Elephant Man six years prior, the famed filmmaker wisely withheld his name from the proceedings in hopes of retaining the thematic weight of the narrative. Yet, when Brooks’s role in the film was made public, he, true to his character, appeared at the premiere and distributed, in his terms, promotional “deely-boppers.”

-Egregious Gurnow

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