Maidgethma Wonderfully offbeat film!

Tedfoldol everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Manthast Absolutely amazing

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

avik-basu1889 Whenever one hears the name David Cronenberg, the two words that automatically come to his/her mind are 'body horror'. But what distinguishes Cronenberg's films from most other films belonging to the 'body horror' category is his ability to add weight, depth and thematic poignancy underneath the horrifying visual aspects of watching a person's body undergo violent and horrific changes.'The Brood' is a wonderful example of an early Cronenberg film where you see him honing his skills and yet managing to make a wonderfully layered and deep film including all the body-horror madness that he is known for. Thematically, 'The Brood' explores quite a number of issues under the supernatural cloak. Some of the themes that Cronenberg delves into are:1. Divorce and custody battles - This is I believe a prominent subtext running throughout the film. We see Frank and Nola Carveth tussling against each other over the issue of who gets to spend more time with their daughter. It is also well documented that this was a very personal film for Cronenberg as he himself had gone through a similar custody battle over his child and he has called 'The Brood' his version of 'Kramer vs Kramer' and this knowledge actually makes the film far more disturbing. The film is a cinematic representation of the chaos caused by a bitter divorce.2. Disintegration of the family structure - Cronenberg is subtly making a comment on the way the general and basic family structure is getting disintegrated with the passage of time. There is clear commentary in the film on the issue of how bad and abusive parenting can have potentially permanent scarring effects on the child caught in the middle of the broken family. But in true Cronenberg style, this mental scarring is represented through external bodily growths like rashes and blisters. 3. Pride - The character of Hal Raglan is immensely interesting. He uses the phenomenon of psychoplasm to compel his patients to let go of their inner repressed anger and rage, although this will lead to the growth of disturbing rashes on their bodies, but at least they will end up getting some mental relief. I don't think Raglan was a villain. I think he genuinely wanted to help his patients. But he had one big flaw - his pride and his arrogance in thinking that he could use Nola to prove his expertise and in a way show everyone the power of psychoplasmic techniques. In trying to do so, he let his pride blind him to the fact that he was worsening the mental condition of Nola. When he realised his mistakes, it was too late.4. Rage - Last, but by no means least, 'The Brood' is certainly about rage and how repressed and inner rage when released can lead to devastating consequences.Technique-wise, the film combines restraint and flashiness very well. In the initial scenes, Cronenberg keeps the setting and the tone reasonably realistic and only faintly flirts with supernatural elements. But as the story progresses, the supernatural elements keep becoming more and more prominent. When it comes to creating tension, some parts of the film are undeniably influenced by Hitchcock, especially a murder scene which is heavily inspired by 'Psycho' judging by the editing and the music playing over it. Oliver Reed has a dominant, charismatic presence. He is dramatic and uses his booming voice to full effect. Art Hindle provides the necessary understated performance in the film. Some might say that he is a bit bland, but I think it is his realistic and understated portrayal of Frank which allows the more dramatic and flashy performances in the film to work. But for me, the best performance in the film comes from Samantha Eggar. She exudes this air of creepiness that Cronenberg accentuates with his style of shooting her face up close with a lot of close-up shots. She uses her eyes brilliantly. She also shows range as she has to break into moments of vulnerability along with the moments of rage. The conversation scenes between Eggars and Reed are masterful with Cronenberg's brilliant camera placement and editing along with brilliant performances from the two actors.My only gripe with the film is the character of Jan Hartog. I don't really think this character works in the film. The introduction is awkward and the role he plays is completely perfunctory in the context of the screenplay, but he is not at all interesting as a character. 'The Brood' is an early example of Cronenberg mastering his skills at blending 'body-horror' with deep and cerebral issues to make the film not just visually disturbing, but also intellectually provocative. Some critics have accused the film of being anti- feminist. Now I don't agree with that thought as I think Cronenberg is attacking bad parenting as a whole and not just bad mothers, but it is the kind of response that Cronenberg's films can provoke out of people due to their nature and style. 'The Brood' is not for everyone and it is not flawless(I think), but it is a film that I can't help recommending big time.

SnoopyStyle Unconventional psychologist Hal Raglan (Oliver Reed) runs the Somafree Institute in Toronto with his technique called Psychoplasmics. Frank Carveth (Art Hindle) finds his little daughter Candice with scratches on her back. He suspects his ex-wife Nola (Samantha Eggar) who is Hal Raglan's patient. Then a childlike monster kills Nola's mother while Candice is in the house. This leads to more murders and a horrifying secret.It's a slow start and I would rather not deal with all the psychobabble. This seems to be another bloody but traditional killer-child horror movie. Then director David Cronenberg goes to the next level. Nobody does psycho-sexual body-horror quite like him. He brings another weird cinematic visual that will never leave my brain. For that, I will forever curse and love the man.

Mr_Ectoplasma David Cronenberg's "The Brood" parallels the stories of Frank (Art Handle), a man attempting to assimilate his young daughter back into daily life after she was taken in by a cult her mother has joined; and the mentally ill mother, Nola (Samantha Eggar)'s time spent with a new age psychologist (Oliver Reed) who is treating her at his remote compound. I will be the first to admit that I am not typically fond of science fiction, so I had reservations going into the his film, but I'd heard so many great things about it over the years and purchased the DVD on a blind buy several years ago. I was absolutely blown away by this film, and re-experienced it when I watched it again on its recent Blu-ray release. This is one of those films that has such a cerebral, multi-layered core to it that it could supply an array of PhD theses on everything from cinema violence to child abuse, to feminism and motherhood.The film is set against the backdrop of a Toronto winter landscape, and Cronenberg captures the sombre chill of the winter with extreme effectiveness; the entire film is bathed in winter light, desaturated grey, and eerie nighttime photography. The chilling establishment of locale is merely the underpinning of the imaginative, cerebral script, and has a steady level of suspense that becomes more and more oppressive as the film drives toward its disturbing conclusion. Cronenberg uses parallel editing to tell the story, setting the father and daughter's lives against the isolation of Nola and her mysterious doctor.While the film is inarguably earns its category of science fiction, I believe the reason I found it so appealing was because the first two acts are set up almost like a slasher picture-meets-psycho thriller, albeit with bizarre monster kids wielding the weapons. The "whodunit?" element keeps the audience vested in the film, and the real psychological core comes to light in the phenomenal quasi-Shakespearean conclusion. The last fifteen minutes of the film are expertly done and truly cement the film as one worthy of the "classic" title. Samantha Eggar and Oliver Reed are fantastic here; Art Hindle is probably the weakest link, but his performance is still enough to keep interest maintained.Overall, "The Brood" is one of the most unique and intelligent sci-fi horror films I've seen. The material is expertly handled and the film ratchets suspense like clockwork. The cold, wintry backdrop gives the film an extra chill, and Samantha Eggar's performance alone is reason enough to watch. Highlights: the break-in through grandma's milk delivery door, and the utterly macabre conclusion featuring one of cinema's most disturbed mothers (Faye Dunaway, step aside). 10/10.

Jovan Nikolic "Long live the new flesh!" – the very remarkable sentence from "Videodrome" by James Woods in that moment seemed belated as David Cronenberg already made strong statement with body horrors like "Shivers", "Rabid", and "The Brood". Having previous experience with Cronenberg's work, "The Brood" is not different from his earlier works – it is also filled with externalizations of unconscious into some organic forms, creatures or non-human living organisms.It's very much a film of its time. It's slow paced, characters are weak and inconvincible, I felt no true horror in the story and setting, except the perversion of motherhood and presence of "mad scientist" (and even Oliver Reed couldn't make Dr. Raglan mad enough) who was "playing with the brains of his patients". Even with all that being said, I really respect Cronenberg's directing as he succeeded in creating detached sense of reality – throughout whole movie you will be suck in the "plot" like there exist nothing else in this world – Cronenberg's signature is omnipresent.After I've watched the film, I thought – well, it obviously doesn't work as horror for me, but there is strength in portrayal of little girl. From the very beginning, she is completely quite and anemic. The devastating effect the divorce of her parents has one her is evident, mainly in the fact that there is no safe place for her – wherever she is, it's only death, terror and violence. Even her grandparents were divorced and have had terrible marriage (both Barton and Juliana are alcoholics). Near the very end, there is dialogue between her parents; in the middle of arguing mother said that she would rather kill their daughter than let her father have the custody arousing a tremendous rage in her father and ended by being strangled by him. When there is continuity of rage, unhappiness and absence of love among parents (sorry if I am pathetic) – childhood itself is horror.I've read that, at the time of making this movie, Croneberg personally went through divorce and custody trials, and somehow I like to believe that this film was greatly inspired by his terrible experience and frustration.