David Cronenberg: Author or Film-Maker?, and: Videodrome. Studies in the Horror Film, and: The Cinema of David Cronenberg: From Baron of Blood to Cultural Hero (review)
Notice bibliographique
Résumé
Mark Browning, David Cronenberg: Author or Film-Maker? Bristol, UK: Intellect, 2007. 206pp. US$25; £17.50 (pbk).Tim Lucas, Videodrome. Studies in the Horror Film. Lakewood, CO: Millipede, 2008. 206pp. US$25; £16.22 (pbk).Ernest Mathijs, The Cinema of David Cronenberg: From Baron of Blood to Cultural Hero. Director's Cuts. Wallflower, 2008. 312 pp. US$26; £16.99 (pbk).In my review of Serge Grunberg's 2006 collection of interviews with Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg in the first issue of SFFTV, I concluded that 'we await the booklength study that can do this brilliant, seminal auteur full justice'. Ernest Mathijs's The Cinema of David Cronenberg: From Baron of Blood to Cultural Hero makes a decent stab at being this much-needed study, while Tim Lucas's monograph on Videodrome is an exemplary production history of a pivotal work in the Cronenberg canon. Unfortunately, Mark Browning's book is another kettle of fish entirely, but these three works, taken together, certainly show that critical engagement with this complex and elusive talent remains a lively enterprise.Let's take the Lucas volume first, since it is the most modestly purposed and, largely for that reason, the most successful of the lot. Lucas is publisher-editor of the journal Video Watchdog, which has, for two decades now, provided essential commentary on sf, fantasy, horror and 'exploitation' titles available on VHS and DVD. During the 1980s, Lucas was a main reviewer for Video Times, where his column examined the ways VHS versions of films had been cut or otherwise altered, leading to a greater attention to such matters among cinephiles and, eventually, the home video industry itself. Before that, Lucas was, for a time, a freelance writer for Cinefantastique, a glossy magazine that focused on fantastic film (it ceased publication in 2006 and became an e-zine, ). Indeed, his book on Videodrome (Canada 1983) is the lateblooming fruit of a 1981-82 assignment for that publication, which led him to visit the set of Cronenberg's film twice during shooting - the only journalist permitted to do so. Portions of the manuscript appeared in the magazine, but in such an amended form that Lucas 'disowned the result and ended [his] ten-year affiliation with Cinefantastique' (16). Piers Handling's anthology The Shape of Rage: The Films of David Cronenberg (1984) included a section of the manuscript, as did the magnificent 2004 Criterion Collection DVD of Videodrome, but this entry in Millipede's Studies in Horror Film is its first full airing. It was worth the wait.Lucas's approach is eclectic: mixing interviews with Cronenberg, actors James Woods and Deborah Harry and special-effects coordinator Rick Baker with first-hand information regarding the circumstances of the film's production, the book is, as Handling reportedly commented, perhaps the 'most thorough account of a Canadian film production' extant (qtd in Lucas 17). At times, it must be admitted, Lucas's coverage borders on the fannish, as in the lengthy descriptions of the film's notorious special-effects set-pieces - though it is interesting to hear how the 'stomach slit', 'hand gun', and exploding 'flesh TV' were accomplished, and especially amusing to discover, in relation to the scene wherein Woods's character makes love to a television set, that the only surface flexible enough to expand while sustaining a projected image was a dental dam. Meanwhile, as these carefully orchestrated tableaux were unfolding, Cronenberg would hop around shouting 'More blood! More blood!' and, in the case of Spectacular Optical CEO Barry Convex's grisly demise, 'More cancer! More cancer!' (99).More interesting are the insider accounts of the workings of a complex shoot: the principal location was an abandoned Toronto nursery school, which housed the main sets (including the eponymous torture chamber), along with areas for cast and crew recreation. Since the sets were not soundproofed, demands for total silence during filming were transmitted throughout the building via walkie- talkie; a flushing toilet could ruin a perfect take. …
Récupéré en direct depuis OpenAlex et désinversé. Les résumés ne sont pas conservés dans cette base de données : les index inversés représentent 8,6 Go des 9,3 Go de texte de la base, et le serveur dispose de 13 Go libres.
Comment cette classification a été obtenuedéplier
Prédiction distillée sur la base complète
Imitation des enseignantsNi prévalence calibrée, ni vérité terrain. Validation humaine à venir. Apprise à partir de 10 348 étiquettes directes de Codex et de 10 348 étiquettes directes de Gemma. Le mode candidate est l'union des têtes enseignantes seuillées; le consensus est leur intersection. Ces sorties portent le statut machine_predicted_unvalidated et ne sont ni des étiquettes humaines ni des étiquettes directes de modèles de pointe.
Scores Codex et Gemma par catégorie
| Catégorie | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Métarecherche | 0,004 | 0,004 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens strict) | 0,000 | 0,000 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens large) | 0,000 | 0,000 |
| Bibliométrie | 0,000 | 0,001 |
| Études des sciences et des technologies | 0,000 | 0,003 |
| Communication savante | 0,000 | 0,001 |
| Science ouverte | 0,001 | 0,000 |
| Intégrité de la recherche | 0,000 | 0,000 |
| Charge utile insuffisante (le modèle a refusé de juger) | 0,000 | 0,000 |
Scores machine (provisoires)
Les deux têtes enseignantes du modèle étudiant, lues sur ce travail. Un score ordonne la base pour la relecture; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie, et le statut de validation accompagne chaque rangée tel quel.
Scores de référence d'un modèle non mature (critères de maturité non atteints, 7 itérations). Un score ordonne; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · tel quel depuis la passe de notation : score_only signifie que le nombre peut ordonner les travaux, et qu'aucune étiquette de catégorie n'en découleClassification
machine, non validéePrédiction automatique; un appel candidat d’une seule tête enseignante, pas un consensus.
Le détail, modèle par modèle et score par score, se trouve en fin de page sous « Comment cette classification a été obtenue ».