Day 256 of the challenge! Armpit vampires last week, sex zombies this week. Shivers is Cronenberg at his rawest and unrefined.
Quick question: What could possibly go wrong with specially bred parasites designed to replace organs that need transplants? If you said sex zombies, you got it right! It was definitely not where I was expecting this movie to go after it’s funny and over the top set up.
I’ve seen plenty of horror movies over the years that play on sexual anxiety and fears to get their scares in (It Follows is a favorite of mine), but any message Cronenberg was trying to make with Shivers gets lost in a sea of chronic rape, incest, and other forms of sexual violence. Fun for the whole family. Minus the subtly horrifying closing moments of the film, Shivers only seems interested in reveling in it’s mission to be as shocking and depraved as possible, with hints of the more skillful (but just as weird) Cronenberg peaking through from time to time. Proceed with caution.