“Be afraid! Be very afraid!” – one of horror’s most famous lines, imitated many times over, originated from tonight’s film, David Cronenberg’s classic body horror exercise in terror The Fly (1986). A very different film than the original 1956 Vincent Price classic, the terrifying fate of Seth Brundle is a much more horrific and grotesque look at what happens when a man is spliced with the DNA of a common house fly. Look out for…Brundlefly. Let the fun begin! Thomas Mariani, Doc Rotten and Christopher G. Moore tackle another gruesome horror film from the 1980s.
Decades of Horror 1980s
Episode 91 — The Fly (1986)
Coming off his classics Scanners, Videodrome and The Dead Zone, director David Cronenberg crafts his most accessible and more disgusting masterpieces with The Fly (1986). With Seth Brundle, he takes his obsession with body horror to new heights as Brundle’s body slowly rejects his human body and becomes half-man, half-fly. The man becomes Brundlefly! Jeff Goldblum stars as Brundle giving the character a lonely, driven pathos that starkly contrasts to the personality – and vitality – the fly-infused version exhibits. The result is fascinating…to the audience. To his love interest reporter Veronica Quaife (Geena Davis), it is terrifying! John Getz rounds out the cast as Stathis Borans, the editor of the magazine Veronica works for, his character is obsessed with exposing Brundle until he fears for Veronica’s life and steps into Brundle’s path of horror. Oh, and did we say the film was gory. Yeah, it is gory.
Thomas Mariani is joined by Doc Rotten and Christopher G. Moore to take a look on of the best remakes of a horror film ever made. The grue-crew examine the performances, the direction and the effects as they discuss Seth’s journey from Brundle to Brundlefly. They marvel at Jeff Goldblum’s terrific performance in the lead role, wondering how did he get overlooked at the Oscars that year. Geena Davis makes an impressive debut providing the line of warning from this article’s introduction. But it’s the effects that astonish, amaze and nauseate the crew as they look at the transformation and the methods of dissolving Brudlefly’s food. Then the discussion turns to whether The Fly is Cronenberg’s best film of his entire career.
We want to hear from you – the coolest, most gruesome fans: leave us a message or leave a comment on the site or email the Decades of Horror 1980s podcast hosts at thomasmariani@decadesofhorror.com or docrotten@decadesofhorror.com. We also want to be sure to thank Neon Devils for their killer track “Bone Chillin'” which we use for the intro and outro of this show.
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Doc a lifelong fan of horror films, sci-fi flicks and monster movies first discovering Universal Monsters and Planet of the Apes as a young child in the 1970's searching out every issue of Famous Monster of Filmland (and, later, Fangoria). Favorite films include Jaws, The Car, The Birds, The Tingler, Vampire Circus and The Exorcist. Still a huge fan of horror films from the 70s, Doc continues consuming horror films to this day for the site, for the podcasts and for the fun of it all.
