The breed
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The breed |
| Original title | The Brood |
| Country of production | Canada |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1979 |
| length | 92 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | David Cronenberg |
| script | David Cronenberg |
| production | Claude Héroux |
| music | Howard Shore |
| camera | Mark Irwin |
| cut | Alan Collins |
| occupation | |
| |
The Brut (original title The Brood ) is a Canadian horror film from 1979 by David Cronenberg with Oliver Reed , Samantha Eggar and Art Hindle .
Several people from the circle of friends of the architect Frank Carveth fell victim to a series of murders. The perpetrators, a group of disfigured children, turn out to be parthenogenetically generated products of Carveth's mentally disturbed wife Nola. After all, Carveth not only has to fight for custody, but also for the life of his and Nola's daughter Candy.
action
The divorced architect Frank Carveth shares custody of his daughter Candy with his mentally unstable wife Nola, who lives on the grounds of the "Somafree Institute" of psychotherapist Hal Raglan. Raglan has developed a method called "Psychoplasmics", with the help of which patients process their mental disorders in the form of psychosomatic illnesses, which are then to be cured by conventional medical methods.
After Frank notices traces of abuse on his daughter after Candy's visit to her mother Nola, he tries to get the mother and daughter banned from visiting. Nola's mother Juliana agrees to take in Candy. At the same time, Raglan learns during his therapy sessions with Nola that she was abused by her mother as a young girl without her father Barton intervening. In the evening, Juliana is attacked and killed by a misshapen child; Candy, who joins them, is in shock but remains unharmed.
Juliana's ex-husband Barton arrives for Juliana's funeral. He later tries in vain to contact his daughter Nola at Raglan's clinic. Frank asks Candy's teacher Ruth Mayer to take care of his daughter and drives to Juliana's apartment, where Barton is staying for the duration of his stay. Barton is also murdered by a misshapen child. It is killed when it tries to attack Frank. Meanwhile, Nola threatens Candy's babysitter Ruth on the phone. During the autopsy of the dead child, at which Frank is present, it turns out that it does not have a navel, so it was not born naturally. When Raglan learns of the discovery of the living being, he closes his clinic and transfers his patients, with the exception of Nola, to other institutions.
In the morning two of the disfigured children visit Candy's school, kill Ruth and kidnap Candy. In a conversation with a former patient of Raglan, Frank learns that Nola was referred to and envied as a “queen bee” by the other inmates because Raglan paid special attention to her. He drives to the clinic, where Raglan explains to him that Nola compensates for her unprocessed anger against other people by giving birth to beings who try to eliminate those who caused their anger through acts of violence. Raglan agrees to free Candy from a room in Nola's hut, where she is guarded by the "brood" while Frank distracts Nola. Frank sees with his own eyes how Nola gives birth to one of her "children" who grow up in skin sacks on her body. His disgust arouses Nola's anger and with it the brood from their twilight sleep, which first kills Raglan and then turns against Candy. Frank strangles Nola, whereupon the attackers collapse lifeless. He frees his daughter and drives her back to town. The last picture shows Candy's arms covered in blisters like their mother's already had.
background
The brood originated on a budget of 1.5 million Canadian dollars in Toronto and Mississauga , Ontario . The executive producer Victor Solnicki (who also Scanners and Videodrome produced) referred to him in retrospect as his favorite among Cronenberg's films. The Brut was also Cronenberg's first collaboration with the composer Howard Shore , who wrote his first film music here. Shore composed all the soundtracks for Cronenberg's subsequent films with one exception ( Dead Zone ) .
The film opened on May 25, 1979 in the USA , on June 1 of the same year in Canada and on November 12, 1982 in German cinemas. The brood was a financial success, although the American distributor New World Pictures advertised the film as a B horror film .
For the cinema release in the USA, Canada and Great Britain, the respective censorship authorities issued some extensive editing requirements, including a scene in which Samantha Eggar licks clean one of her newly born "children". The result, says Cronenberg, was that many viewers thought she was going to eat her child, which was much worse than what he wanted to show.
The film was removed from the index in April 2013. The German first broadcast on free TV took place on November 27, 2014 on Tele 5. In March 2017, the German age rating was reduced to 16.
Subject
Cronenberg himself called Die Brut the "most classic" horror film he would have ever made and, together with Die Fliege and Die Unzertrennlichen , one of his most autobiographical works: During the preparatory work for the film, Cronenberg found himself in a custody dispute over his daughter from his first marriage. Cronenberg: “I said that ad nauseam , but The Brut was my version of Kramer versus Kramer [successful divorce drama from 1979]. [...] I find it false, fake, sweet. […] The brood got to the real nightmare, the terrible, barely believable core of this situation. [...] I actually felt so bad. It was really so terrible, so hurtful. That's why the film demanded to be made, and with full force. If you get philosophical or clarified, you make a different film. "
The Canadian film critic Robin Wood saw in The Brut a representative of the " reactionary " horror film of the 1970s. As evidence, he cited, among other things, the figure of the scientist who, in an effort to promote social progress, brings about the catastrophe, the projection of horror and evil onto female sexuality, the fear of women who take on the traditional active and aggressive role of men, and finally, that the woman's anger does not appear as a logical reaction to her situation in a patriarchal system, but is entirely due to another woman (Nola's mother). On the other hand, Danny Peary defended the film in Cult Movies (as opposed to Parasite Killer and Rabid , who he rejected) because the viewer empathizes with the characters, even with Nola, who is a victim of their upbringing.
reception
Reviews
"An excellently made, albeit basically unpleasant shocker."
"A bore [...] repulsive, and not even in an entertaining way [...] Are there really people who want to see such reprehensible garbage?"
"Cronenberg's best film [...] one and a half hours of captivating, dense cinema."
"What in Cronenberg's conception might have been thought of as a dark, pessimistic vision of the subconscious, is nothing more than a horror film that draws its ideas from family frustrations and trauma and gets lost in countless nauseating scenes."
Awards
In 2006, Die Brut was voted 88th on the Chicago Film Critics Association's “100 Scariest Movies of All-Time” list .
DVD publications
The US DVD from MGM and the UK DVD from Anchor Bay Entertainment contain the uncut version, unlike most other releases.
Web links
- The breeding in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Comparison of the cut versions German VHS (abridged) - US DVD (unabridged) by Die Brut at Schnittberichte.com
- The breeding at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Chris Rodley (Eds.), Cronenberg on Cronenberg , Faber & Faber, 1997.
- ↑ a b The brood in the Internet Movie Database .
- ^ "I've said this ad nauseam , but The Brood was my version of Kramer Vs Kramer . [...] I think it's false, fake, candy. [...] The Brood got to the real nightmare, horrific, unbelievable inner life of that situation. [...] I felt that bad. It was that horrible, that damaging. That's why it had to be made then; it wanted to be made full blast. Getting philosphical and mellow, you make another movie. ”- Chris Rodley (Ed.), Cronenberg on Cronenberg , Faber & Faber, 1997.
- ^ Robin Wood, An Introduction to the American Horror Film, in: Bill Nichols (ed.), Movies and Methods Volume II, University of California Press, 1985.
- ^ Danny Peary, Cult Movies , Dell Publishing, New York 1981.
- ↑ "[...] an extremely well made, if essentially unpleasant shocker." - Review in Variety , December 31, 1978, accessed on November 7, 2011.
- ^ "[…] A bore […] disgusting in ways that are not entertaining […] Are there really people who want to see reprehensible trash like this?" - Review in the Chicago Sun-Times , June 5, 1979, accessed on November 7, 2011.
- ↑ "[...] Cronenberg's best film [...] an hour and a half of absorbing, solid cinema" - Danny Peary, Cult Movies , Dell Publishing, New York 1981.
- ^ The Brut in the Lexicon of International Films , accessed on November 7, 2011.
- ↑ List of the CFCA's 100 Scariest Movies of All-Time on Listal.com , accessed on November 7, 2011.