Who Knew David Cronenberg Had A Daughter?

 Okay, maybe you're not old enough to know David Cronenberg's The Fly or Videodrome. That is your fault, not mine.

Today, I learned from The Walrus that he has a daughter. This daughter has made her first movie. Caitlin Cronenberg’s Humane Asks: Who Would You Kill Off in Your Family? 

I think I want to see this one:

INEVITABLY, Humane will get compared to the works of David and Brandon Cronenberg. When asked whether she’s working in the “family style,” Cronenberg demurs. “I truly see no comparison,” she says. But families, she acknowledges, have sensibilities. And the one she grew up in was talky and brainy. “My dad is fearless,” she adds. “He fought against censorship and for the freedom to make the films he wanted to make, even when people told him not to.” When you grow up in an atmosphere like that, you’re unafraid to be weird. And socially observant. And transgressive.

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And the satire lands because it has so many possible targets. Sibling relations are an obvious one. Once the weapons come out, the family home becomes a domain of ever-shifting allegiances. A character may be swinging a fire poker at his brother in one moment and then desperately trying to save his life the next. Is there a label for this dynamic? This mixture of murderous rage and fierce protectiveness? The word “familial” comes to mind. (Disappointingly, Cronenberg says that Humane isn’t about her family. “I’m going to throw Michael under the bus, here,” she adds. “He’s one of four siblings, and he wrote the script.”)

Simon Lewsen's review is also a very interesting essay on COVID.

Clearly, we’re not yet ready to confront the pandemic head on, which is why the best post-COVID movies aren’t obviously about COVID at all. Humane, the debut film (out April 26) by the photographer Caitlin Cronenberg—sister of Brandon, daughter of David—takes place in an alternative present, a world in which things have gone horribly wrong. Ecological collapse is in full swing. Water is rationed. The sun has become bright and deadly. People carry around strange Warholian umbrellas lined with UV-protective foil.

sch 4/29