For more than thirty years, David Cronenberg has made independent films such as Scanners and A History of Violence which aim to disturb, surprise, and challenge audiences. He has also repeatedly drawn on literary fiction for inspiration, adapting themes from authors like William Burroughs, J. G. Ballard, and Patrick McGrath for the big screen; David Cronenberg: Author or Filmmaker? is the first book to explore how underground and mainstream fiction have influenced—and can help illuminate—his labyrinthine films.
Film scholar Mark Browning examines Cronenberg’s literary aesthetic not only in relation to his films’ obvious source material, but by comparing his movies to the writings of Vladimir Nabokov, Angela Carter, and Bret Easton Ellis. This groundbreaking volume addresses Cronenberg’s narrative structures and his unique conception of auteurism, as well as his films’ shocking psychological frameworks, all in the broader context of film adaptation studies. David Cronenberg is an essential read for anyone interested in the symbiotic relationship between literature and filmmaking.
“David Cronenberg is a work that attempts to illuminate and unravel the connection between the great Canadian auteur and his literary influences.”—Film Snob Weekly
“David Cronenberg is an essential read for anyone interested in the symbiotic relationship between literature and filmmaking.”—Video Canada
Reviews
Table of Contents
Introduction
’A library of extreme metaphors’
Chapter 1
Videodrome:’Not a love story - a film about about pornography’
Chapter 2
Dead Ringers: ’Schizophrenia cannot be understood without understanding despair’
Chapter 3
Naked Lunch: ’Nothing is true: everything is permitted’
Chapter 4
Crash: ’Not a film about pornography - a love story’
Chapter 5
eXistenZ: ’Thou the player of the game art God’
Chapter 6
’The child in time’: Time and space in Cronenberg’s Spider
Conclusion