Videodrome
David Cronenberg
(1983)
As the president of a trashy TV channel, Max Renn is desperate for new programming to attract viewers. When he happens upon "Videodrome," a TV show dedicated to gratuitous torture and punishment, Max sees a potential hit and broadcasts the show on his channel. However, after his girlfriend auditions for the show and never returns, Max investigates the truth behind Videodrome and discovers that the graphic violence may not be as fake as he thought.
Cast
Crew
Overview and Horror Legacy
The pulsating television screen effect was achieved using a sheet of dental dam stretched over a video projector — Baker first tried a weather balloon but it did not stretch enough. The groundbreaking practical effects were created by Rick Baker, whose crew was largely made up of twenty-year-old technicians fresh off An American Werewolf in London. A genuine touchstone of body horror.
Collector Market and Memorabilia
The television growing flesh, Woods' stomach-cavity VCR slot, Harry's burning screen — Cronenberg's vision of media and body converging is still ahead of most cinema that followed it. The imagery has only become more resonant with time.
Cult Status
Videodrome was Cronenberg's first film backed by a major Hollywood studio, with Universal Pictures financing a budget of around six million dollars based on little more than an one-page description from the director. Videodrome was a significant box office failure on its release in 1983, earning just over two million dollars against its six million dollar budget. Critical reception has shifted dramatically over the decades — the film now holds 83% on Rotten Tomatoes and is widely cited as one of Cronenberg's masterworks and a defining text of the body horror genre.
![Videodrome - 1983 - [TV scene]](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.ytimg.com%2Fvi%2F8k7XMhmEUCI%2Fmqdefault.jpg&w=3840&q=75)
