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| Dark murkiness, cobwebs and Ralph Fiennes on the poster for David Cronenberg's Spider |
Spider is a David Cronenberg (Eastern Promises (2007)) psychological drama, (often referred to as a thriller, but since its suspense is so meager, I'd label it a drama), which is an adaptation by Patrick McGrath (The Grotesque (1995) novel and script) of his own novel.
The story in the movie is moved forward by our very subjective implicit storyteller-protagonist, "Spider"/Mr. Cleg, who is arriving at a halfway house [a rehabilitation center where people who have left an institution, such as a hospital or prison, are helped to readjust to the outside world], where he lives with other mentally ill men, while memories carry him back to his childhood.
Spider is a very slow film, from its 3 minute Rorschach credit intro to getting to know Mr. Cleg ever so slowly, and to finally understand, about halfway into the film, what the main suspense will be: How did that sweet little boy become this schizophrenic man?
It is a very passive suspense, also because nearly all of the important action is thus relayed to revisits to old memories. And ultimately too passive and underplayed to consider Spider as a thriller in my mind. It is a psycho-drama, especially fit for the reflectively inclined or for those with curiosity about a schizophrenic's condition.
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| Ralph Fiennes as David Crornenberg's Spider |
Spider benefits greatly from inspired performances from its lead Ralph Fiennes (Schindler's List (1993)), who plays Spider with strong sympathetic insight, and from Gabriel Byrne (Miller's Crossing (1990)) and Miranda Richardson (The Crying Game (1992)). Neither Cronenberg, Fiennes nor Richardson received any salaries for their work in order to make the film come to life on its small budget.
The film plays tricks on us, through its unstable, disturbed storyteller, and this provides some of the insight into the character's fate. But in the end, the tag-line of the general poster above, ('The only thing worse than losing your mind is finding it again'), did not resonate clearly with what I saw in the film. In general, when hearing the actors and filmmakers talk of the film, I get the sense that they have left too much information beneath the floorboards as subtext in Spider. I understand why they left out narration, but somehow I feel that Cronenberg-McGrath should have told us more somehow.
In Cronenberg's impressive oevre, Spider is one of the few underplayed films. To see the Canadian 'king of venereal horror' in his opposite corner, probably the most overplayed of his film is The Fly (1986). Spider was lauded as a truly great film by scores of critics in '02, but it eludes me, since I just can't get very excited about it. Cronenberg's best movies in my opinion are Scanners (1981), Videodrome (1983), The Dead Zone (1983), Blood Brothers (1988), Naked Lunch (1991), A History of Violence (2005) and Eastern Promises (2007). - And that is quite a bunch. Cronenberg is one of cinema's masters of today.
The details:
Spider is elevated by a humorous role as a nervous lunatic played by John Neville (The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988)), which brightens the film up a bit.
It is an otherwise pretty oppressive experience, (as inhabiting the mind of a schizophrenic ought to be, I suppose), heightened also by Cronenberg's distinct framings, this time with the help of cinematographer Peter Suschitzky (Mars Attacks! (1996)). Cronenberg has a strong imagination and a keen eye for the evocative, which is put to good use in Spider, especially with the gas plant outside the row-house.
Cronenberg has finished his coming movie Maps to the Stars (2014), which Film Excess can't wait to see in a cinema.
Related reviews:
David Cronenberg: Cosmopolis (2012) - Cronenberg/DeLilli/Pattinson's speculative limo lullaby
A History of Violence (2005) or, Who Is Tom Stall?
The Brood (1979) or, Marital Fury and Craze!
Watch the trailer here
Budget: 10 mil. $
Box office: 5.8 mil. $
= Big flop
What do you think of Spider?
What is your favorite Cronenberg film?
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