The Fly (1986)

Saw the Cronenberg version of The Fly. It was amazing. Cronenberg does his usual intense body horror thing. The festivities start simply enough, with the central scientist being pricked by an IC. Then he makes a sudden realization that the reason his marvellous teleporter doesn't work is because the computer is "going crazy over the flesh." He continues to wax crazy about "the flesh" (shades of Existenz here) while his girlfriend buys him a thematically appropriate leather jacket. Soon there are phallically squirting fingers and blunt, writhing maggots. Horrible! Awesome!

The central scientist is played by Jeff Goldblum who has his hair long and has obviously been working out. He resembles a sort of science-infused Mowgli, with his own private supply of baboons. After the famous teleportation mishap this image was strengthened for me as he enjoys some fly-powered gymnastics. He becomes more obsessed and intense as the mutation progresses, mistaking the tainting of fly DNA for a purification of some kind. This is Cronenberg's private obsession with purity vs corruption (and later of humanity vs barbarity) coming out here. Eventually the human/fly becomes yet further corrupted by a second infusion, this time with machinery.

The film is shot with a hazy look, almost every shot seems covered by mist or dust. The characters affect trench coats and Jeff's girlfriend is a reporter. These are weird throwbacky references to noir, I think (at one point his girlfriend says she has to "scrape the residue of an old life off of her shoe.") The dustiness reminded me of Naked Lunch, with its roach-powder drugs. The body horror is really great. Each transformation is more uncomfortable than the last culminating with the moment when, at the height of his defeat, we are made to feel a hideous compassion for the fly. Really fun stuff.

Edit: Originally a Tim Burton film? Huh. That would been completely different and interesting.