The Brood.

The Brood is the only film in my recent memory to actually give a physical response to its horrifying content. And while the childlike munchkins that elicited the response have been given ample screen time in numerous horror films sense, Cronenberg’s puts them to most effective use here. However, they are accompanied by a rather thorough melodramatic development about family relationships. Although the lengthy expositions may be occasionally out of place for a horror film, they also effectively work to delay the scare and let it brew just a little longer.

A mother who is undergoing radical and experimental psychotherapy manifests her fear and anger physically; into childlike beings that she births from an external womb and cleans of blood with her mouth. These creatures wreak havoc on her relatives before their source is discovered, causing her ex-husband and daughter the most distress. Admittedly personal, the story is further Cronenbergian in its cultist representation that has found a place in many of his films. And while it contains some classic and disturbing visuals that mark his signature, the film is perhaps the only film that sets out with intention to scare.

We are not immediately treated to the brood, whose faces are distorted and often hidden in the hoods of their brightly colored snowsuits. Yet their evilly mischievous ways are alerted to from the outset. These children, far from innocent, seem to have an infatuation with beating their victim’s head as a kill tactic. Effectiveness is not open to discussion. But the way in which the brood are handled cinematically; carefully obscured, identified by sound, allowed only a quick glimpse, make their first bodily appearance both frightening and disturbing. They have not the soft and clean childhood innocence in their faces nor would their actions conflict such. The success of the film as actually scary comes from this oddity, from what appears to be a small clan of murderous elves.

The Brood hit the scene during a horror movie extravaganza and fared well. At the same time, it was criticized for its misogynistic material and the fact that Cronenberg admits its source as his recent divorce. Nonetheless, the movie remains a creepy and mildly disturbing entry into the horror genre and further proof of the director’s genre mixing capabilities.