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Being a David Cronenberg fan can sometimes feel like a form of self-punishment. From The Brood (1979) to Videodrome (1983), from The Fly (1986) to Crash (1996), the Canadian filmmaker’s oeuvre is largely a mixture of unpleasant-to-genuinely-upsetting movies, fixated from various angles on characters either purposely testing the limits (or falling victim to disturbing changes) of the body. Yet despite the discomforts they bring, it’s hard not to keep coming back for more. Cronenberg’s unsettlingly glacial touch is so assured that you’re engrossed even when you aren’t sure or don’t like where things are going; his gross-outs are more thoughtful than those of filmmakers splurging in ghastly goriness for the sake of it. Though there are some exceptions, you can by now count on his movies to be squeamish, measured meditations on universal fears around bodily change and other cultural anxieties du jour, where the best canvas for expression is always flesh.

With all this in mind, I was surprised at how happy I felt watching Crimes of the Future. It’s not that Cronenberg’s newest project doesn’t have his characteristic unsavoriness — it does — but because, since it’s been about a decade since Cronenberg last made a movie (that was 2014’s noxiously fun Hollywood satire Maps to the Stars), it felt like a gift to be squirming again thanks to a director I’d assumed retired. 

Read the full column on 425.