One of the best moments researching the JG Ballard video essay was watching Crash
Cronenberg is an unnervingly gifted filmmaker. Crash is a lot like an 80s straight-to-video erotic thriller.
Because it kind of is, except it’s now the mid 90s, and Crash, at $10 million dollars, is one of Cronenberg’s higher budget outings.
So the early gratuitous sex scenes seem simply gratuitous. Until Holly Hunter mounts James Spader and acts out the erotic bond they feel after both being badly injured in the same car crash.
The 70s were a strange decade but JG Ballard out-stranged them, writing about the eros of the car crash. I recommend Ballard’s 70s trilogy to anyone new to his work. Crash, High-Rise and Concrete Island are short sharp shocks of Ballard. For most people they will be all you can take.
Ben Wheatley’s 2015 adaptation of High-Rise is…well…dull. It’s like a fashion brand made a 2 hour advertisement themed on the 70s. The cast have fun dressing glam, Wheatley creates some striking imagery, and most of the book’s meaning is completely lost.
I rewatched Empire of the Sun also and, yes, sure, it’s Spielberg. He manages to drag some inspiring moments out of Ballard’s early life, while Ballard himself found only nihilism. But…that’s Spielberg.
Which just highlights the genius of Cronenberg, the only filmmaker to date who has communicated that strange bleak meaninglessness we call BALLARDIAN.
The full JG Ballard video is on the Science Fiction channel.
LINK
Damien Walter 