Spider (2002)

One of the most common descriptors used when discussing the work of David Cronenberg is “cold” or “detached” as it relates to his approach to his material and certainly his characters. While this is true to a certain extent as Cronenberg's films do tend to have a very clinical aesthetic, and his handling of characters could be described as psychoanalytical and fairly objective, with Cronenberg making little to no judgments of his characters, his films are hardly emotionless. For instance the divorce at the center of The Brood (1979) is sure to hit close to home for many as are the family dynamics explored in A History of Violence (2005) and even Maps to the Stars (2014) is an oddly touching film once the final scene ends. The Fly (1986) is well regarded for being a tragic love story at heart and the downfall of the twins in Dead Ringers (1988) is incredibly heartbreaking. Crash (1996), often regarded as Cronenberg's coldest, is, much like The Fly, ultimately revealed to be a love story. While his work was always psychologically complex, around the turn of the new millennium Cronenberg's films started to become even more more psychologically focused and it was Spider in 2002, another film that, clinical on the surface, slowly reveals itself to have a strong emotional core, the prime emotion being melancholy, seemed to usher in a new era for Cronenberg.

After being released from a mental institution, Dennis Cleg (Ralph Fiennes), known as “Spider”, is sent to live in a halfway house. Once there, Spider begins exploring the surrounding neighborhood where he grew up and begins to relive memories of his childhood involving his parents (Miranda Richardson and Gabriel Byrne), gradually putting the pieces of the puzzle that led to his current situation back together.

Even by Cronenberg standards, Spider plays some masterful tricks on the brain. Part of its genius lies in the way the film is structured. It begins simple enough, and the many transitions from past to present are easily discernible, yet Cronenberg slyly complicates matters in the most subtle of ways leading to more and more questions as the film progresses. Although the film isn't a first person narrative, it feels as such and therefore presents everything the way Spider sees it, which in itself poses a lot of questions as it relates to the reliability of his narration given his disposition. Very few films are able to get into a character's mindset with the ease of Spider which is what gives the film a powerful emotional edge. The world Spider inhabits in both his mind and physical surroundings is a sad and lonely place, represented by the films production design and washed out, almost sickly green color scheme. Even the slightly more colorful moments of fantasy taking place in a sunny pasture have a tinge of despair to them. The feeling of gloom and despondency is felt right from the opening credits until the end and eventually does begin to weigh heavy and lingers long after the film has ended. Of course the film rests almost entirely on Fiennes' shoulders who, despite never uttering one single word, only gibberish, brilliantly conveys Spider's tangled through process and Richardson's tackling of not one but three roles plays a major part in the films mental trickery.

Although Spider does suffer from a specific psychological disorder, Cronenberg wisely chose not to name it and even went so far as to remove moments in the script that would have called for effects, stating in an interview “I took the special effects sequences out of the script, because I think those effects... are recognizable to an audience as effects, as hallucinations that can’t possibly be real. And the unspoken purpose of the movie was to make the audience be “Spider.” So when he’s hallucinating and thinking something is real, we must also feel that.” Cronenberg also explained that despite the films focus on psychology, his main interest is still the body stating “Oh, there’s only a fleshy element. I am healing the Cartesian rift. I am an embodied person. I really understand the connection between body and mind... When you’re studying the human mind, you can’t take the mind out of it; you have to put it back into the brain. For me, it’s all body.” Spider is also a film that, if it wasn't already apparent from his entire filmography, Cronenberg, along with Fiennes and Richardson, are all in their chosen professions for the right reasons, with the films low budget forcing all three to defer their salaries and its obvious the amount of care that went into Spider, a film with the same amount of heart as brains behind it.