Philosophical or not, do you need to bring a barf bag?

It was like night and day reading coverage of David Cronenberg’s new film Crimes of the Future. And hilarious too. There couldn’t be more difference between the almost referential coverage of Canadian critics to fellow countryman and auteur’s latest philosophical horror flick. Not referential? Okay, but hardly nary a word of criticism or skepticism either. By contrast, the New York Post’s critic came right out and said this movie might make you throw up.  “You might actually vomit,” says Johnny Oleksinski. It’s hard to know whether Oleksinski thinks the film is up to critical snuff. But it’s hilarious reading his review. “Viewers’ hands flew up to shield their faces from the full-view blood, organs and intestines that enveloped the screen. I was seated in the front row, which was practically a splash zone. Two confused, squirming, squealing women next to me surely got lost on the way to Top Gun: Maverick.” I guess he is critical since he calls the movie’s theme “warped,” saying it “makes the technological apocalypse of Terminator look like a Build-a-Bear Workshop.” And a wink that maybe Cronenberg is really satirizing his own arts community. “We hope that all these offal offenses are meant to satirize our own world’s pretentious artists. Perhaps pale, black-hood-wearing Saul is a stand-in for Tilda Swinton in a glass box at MoMA or a Banksy drawing shredding itself.” Compare that to Canada’s three national newspapers - National Post, The Globe and Mail and Toronto Star – including reviews and lengthy interviews with the director. National Post’s Chris Knight: the film is “a fascinating foray into ideas that have long obsessed the thoughtful Toronto director.” And “The film explores the ways in which we are both at home in our bodies and outside them, treating them as means to get what we need, but also as the very vessels that have those needs.” The Globe’s Barry Hertz says it “is a testament to (Cronenberg’s) singularly twisty, squishy, uncompromising vision” and a “magnificently dirty movie.” Also, “Every millimetre of this film is filthy, decayed, polluted. And thank God for that.” It’s “a ruthlessly meditative film” exploring ideas and “a strangled cry against our self-destructive tendency to poison our own environment.” And Toronto Star’s Marriska Ferandes: “Shocking viewers has never been his intention” but the film is “a dark satire meant to entertain and start a dialogue” on matters like “technology and creativity.” After reading these views you be the judge. I've normally been a Cronenberg fan but after digesting these pieces I'm almost nauseous at the idea of going to the flick. 

Crimes of the Future is playing at Windsor and Detroit-area cinemas.