Along with David Lynch, Terry Gilliam and Alejandro Jodorowsky there is David Cronenbeg. The Canadian director of The Fly, The Brood and Dead Ringers is one of the foremost practitioners of the 'body horror' genre. Body horror films typically focus on the graphic degeneration of the body through disease, decay and parasites. Videodrome is about what happens when the head of a small television station (played by James Woods) acquires some seedy programming and eventually begins to lose touch with reality. The film saves most of the weirdness for its climax where Woods develops a large abdominal wound and inserts a VHS into it. Videodrome is visceral and violent but undoubtedly original, featuring a great performance from Woods and a truly weird cameo by Debbie Harry as an S&M enthusiast. Long live the new flesh.
