While waiting to see the new Infinity Pool, which will be presented in the line-up of the upcoming Berlinale 2023, the previous film by the son of the great David can be streamed on Prime Video, an existential techno-nightmare that gets stronger (also) of the interpretations of Andrea Riseborough and Christopher Abbott.
The aesthetics of certain machinery, and the presence of Jennifer Jason Leigh in a certain specific role, make one think of existence, needless to deny it. And if you are the son of a cumbersome father like David Cronenberg it is difficult to free oneself completely from its shadow, and from its influence.
Yet it is undeniable how Brandon Cronenbergcon Possessorhas done its thing (in its home, some would say): something that, if perhaps it can pay homage to dad’s cinema, still goes straight in its own, clear and personal direction.
Sure, there are certain needles that stick into the brain, and other strange gadgets, like goggles that are very Cronenbergian, but here, in Possessormore than of body horror it is about tecno-thrillere more than with matters of the body one deals with those of the mindwith reasoning of a social (and even economic, for that matter) but also, and above all, existential nature.
The plot, simple in its appearance, complex in implications and meanings, is quickly summed up. Andrea Riseborough (very good, as usual) is Tasya Vos, a killer who works by entering with her mind – possessing, in fact – the body of unsuspecting characters to whom she physically commits the murders. But when she enters Colin’s body (Christopher Abbottvery good too), in order to kill her father-in-law, at the head of a very rich data-mining company, something goes wrong, and she remains trapped there, fighting for control of the body with Colin’s conscience.
Watch Possessor on Prime Video now
The one of Brandon Cronenberg is clearly a dystopia that reasons on the dynamics of the present: not so much for the question of killings, even if entering with one’s mind into another’s body is a clear allusion to the frequent, conscious or unconscious, tendency to assume other identities in the our life online, when about what posing as something other than oneself means in terms of psychological equilibrium and in terms of social relationships.
Not to mention that the economic context, what is now defined as that of “surveillance capitalism”, also plays a not indifferent role.
The formal care is extreme and very modern. In the cold, abstract and razor-sharp photography of Karim Hussain vaguely remember certain things of Refn net – and so net – of neon fetishes and not of Danish; in addition Cronenberg guesses some visual choices of great impact (the images in which the faces, or masks, melt and recompose and overlap).
But, above all, the one that Possessor tells is a story – the story of Vos, but in some ways also that of Colin – which poses rather uncomfortable questions about identity in the digital age, forcing its protagonist to come to terms with the true meaning of her emotional and family ties , and even her maternal role, all based on a perverse mix of voluntary actions and dehumanizing drives that come from the economic structure.
Perhaps the conceptual thickness of David’s best works will not be reached, but with Possessor Brandon Cronenberg proves to have a well-defined directorial personality, clear ideas and the desire to avoid making a useless cast of his father’s cinema, as well as to flatter himself on the dull and anemic forms of too much contemporary cinema. And from this point of view it is undeniable that Possessor has the ability to leave a mark, a malaise, an uneasiness in the viewer, even after the end of the credits.
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