Fun fact: David Cronenberg made an underground movie called Crimes In The Future in 1970, but aside from a few thematic similarities, his latest film of the same name is not a remake. What it is, however, is the director fully back on the body horror beat. Check out the full trailer for the movie, which stars Léa Seydoux, Viggo Mortensen, Kristen Stewart, Scott Speedman and Don McKellar.
Crimes'' story is a typically Cronenbergian dive into body mods and emotion. In a not-so-distant future, humankind is learning to adapt to its synthetic surroundings. Their biological makeup changed, many humans have adapted to life with "Accelerated Evolution Syndrome" thanks partly to specialized equipment that aids in everything from eating to sleeping.
Beloved performance artist Saul Tenser (Mortensen) sleeps in a womb-like bed suspended in mid-air. The OrchidBed, as it’s called, comes complete with software to anticipate, and adjust his every bodily need.
The machine even detects the growth of new organs, which Saul’s creative partner Caprice (Seydoux) can observe and tattoo in his personal operating theatre. Together, Saul and Caprice have turned the discovery and removal of these new body organs into performance art, via sold-out voyeuristic surgical shows using a sarcophagus-like machine where the surgeries take place.
These human evolutionary changes do not receive universal positivity. Before long, a new secret government entity is established - the National Organ Registry, led by bureaucrats Wippet (McKellar) and Timlin (Stewart) - to discreetly track new organ growths, with particular enthusiasm for Saul’s artistic anomalies.
With increased scrutiny on the syndrome and therefore his art, Saul is forced to consider what would be his most shocking performance of all...
Crimes Of The Future will premiere at the upcoming Cannes Film Festival, but we're still waiting to see when it'll land in the UK.