THE SHROUDS  (in theatres)                                                                        

Director David Cronenberg’s imaginative fecundity never ceases to astound; his intelligence and heuristic vastness touches realms of horror, (The King of Venereal Horror) science fiction; blending transformation, both physical, psychological with wonders of technology; following addictively, his products from the 70’s until today (“Crimes of the Future”, “Shivers”, “The Brood”, “Scanners”, “The Fly”, “Dead Ringers. “Naked Lunch”, “Crash”, “History of Violence”) “The Shrouds” is his most personal and pulsates with the profundity of loss, anguish and the vicissitudes of living beyond irreparable loss. A stellar cast throbs with haunting, horrific interpretations of bodily cauterizations, disintegration, dissolving personalities as death encroaches. It is a terrifying, chilling but fascinating premise.

“Krash” (depicted outrageously, prodigiously wonderful by French actor Vincent Cassel) an entrepreneur of renown (a facsimile of David Cronenberg) develops a tool/video where he may view his wife’s slow dissolution, as she slips beyond physicality; his methodology has fostered a unique cemetery with other “shrouded” victims viewed by grief-stricken mourners. In tandem within the high-tech house of the dead is a restaurant featuring shrouded, concrete statues.

Diane Kruger in a triplicate role as “Becca/Terry/Hunny” (Krash’s wife, sister-in-law and avatar) never complicates, or confuses the spectator; with her astral performance she sucks the viewer into a morass of despair over her upcoming death, the bane of a lost sister and the robotic responses of an A.I. mimic. Her sister’s (Terry) ex-husband “Maury” (another multifaceted delineation by Guy Pearce) is the technological wizard behind the voyeuristic cemetery, the plot careens into an abyss after a sacrilegious invasion of the sacred space.

Saturated throughout “The Shrouds” is possibly Cronenberg’s infatuation with The Shroud of Turin (between 1300 & 3000 years old); mystery perpetually plagues the shroud possessed of human DNA and plant species; it is not a painting. Whether it is a miraculous relic or a genius forgery, its enigma continues to taunt experts. Krash may persevere in his quest, but time, like Ozymandias, will render Becca and him into nothingness.

THREE & 1/2 STARS!!!

Peneflix