- Shivers (film)
Infobox_Film
name = Shivers
caption = Shivers film poster under an alternate title
writer =David Cronenberg
starring = Paul Hampton
Barbara Steele
Lynn Lowry
Joe Silver
Ronald Mlodzik
Fred Doederlin
Allan Migicovsky
director =David Cronenberg
producer =Ivan Reitman
editing = Patrick Dodd
distributor = Cinépix Film Properties Inc.
released = 1975
runtime = 87 min.
language = English
budget = C$179,000 (est.) | music = Fred Mollin
awards =
amg_id = 1:49409
imdb_id = 0073705"Shivers" (filmed as "Orgy of the Blood Parasites"; alternate titles: "The Parasite Murders", "They Came from Within", and "Frissons" for the French Canadian distribution) is a 1975
Canadian horror film written and directed byDavid Cronenberg .Plot
Dr. Emil Hobbes (Fred Doederlin) is conducting unorthodox experiments with parasites for use in transplants, however, he believes that humanity has become over-
rational and lost contact with its flesh and its instincts, so the effects of the organism he actually develops is a combinationaphrodisiac andvenereal disease . Once implanted, it causes uncontrollable sexual desire in the host. Hobbes implants the parasites in his teen-aged mistress, who promiscuously spreads them throughout the ultra-modern apartment building, outsideMontreal , where they live. The community's resident physician, Roger St. Luc (Paul Hampton), and his assistant, Nurse Forsythe (Lynn Lowry) attempt to stop the parasite infestation before it overwhelms the city's population.About the film
The film's chaotic structure mirrors the collapse of residential life in the apartment block. The opening shows a young couple being welcomed as residents to the tower block, intercut with Dr Hobbes murdering his adolescent mistress by strangling her, then cutting open her stomach and pouring acid into her body to kill the parasites, and then cutting his own throat. Partway into the story, the audience learn the reason for Hobbes's actions; most of "Shivers" consists of social set piece tableaux showing the sexual promiscuity that spreads the parasites to the other residents.
Director Cronenberg said he identified with the residents after they were infected; and shows the swinging sterility of "normal" life mercilessly caricatured through the characterisation of the bland, rich, young professionals inhabiting the apartment block, and the hard-sell
estate agent 's sales pitch from Merrick (Ronald Mlodzik), which accompanies the opening titles."Shivers" was Cronenberg's first
feature film , and was the most profitable Canadian film made to date in 1975, but was so controversial that theCanadian parliament debated its social and artistic value and effect upon society, because of a conservative magazine movie reviewer's objection to itssexual andviolent content.Controversy
Right-wing Canadian journalist
Robert Fulford attacked the content of "Shivers" in the pages of the national magazine "Saturday Night". Since Cronenberg's film was partially financed by the taxpayer-fundedNational Film Board of Canada (or NFB), Fulford headlined the article "You Should Know How Bad This Movie Is, You Paid For It". Not only did this high profile attack make it more difficult for Cronenberg to obtain funding for his subsequent breakthrough movies, [ [http://www.filmreferencelibrary.ca/index.asp?layid=46&csid1=15&navid=46 The Film Reference Library ] ] but Cronenberg later said Fulford's attack on him also resulted in him being kicked out of his apartment in Toronto. [ [http://baconcronenberg.free.fr/ Le cinéma de David Cronenberg et la peinture de Francis Bacon - Regards croisés ] ]Popular Culture
American Black Metal/Death Metal band Azathoth use a sample from Lynn Lowry's monologue in the film on the track "In Darkest Dreams" off of their self-titled EP.
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