The new Demi Moore film, "The Substance," has been causing quite a stir since its release, and for good reason. It is a shocking, over-the-top, gory example of a scary movie subgenre called Body Horror.
I'm a massive fan of Body Horror, but oddly, I wasn't crazy about "The Substance" (see my capsule review here).
So, I want to share better examples of this subgenre.
But before I can share my favorites, I should clarify that at least eight would be directed by one man, which would be unfair.
That's because the Godfather of the Genre, the man with the most and the best Body Horror Films of all time, is, without question, David Cronenberg.
So, first, here is my list of Cronenberg's Best Body Horror Films, in order of chronological release. They are ALL great and definitely worth seeing, but I put an asterisk next to the ones that are my very favorites.
And now that we have the king's list posted, let's get to the others.
TOP 10 BEST BODY HORROR FILMS BESIDES DAVID CRONENBERG'S
(in no particular order)
1) TITANE
Here's exactly what I posted on Facebook only minutes after seeing this film in September of 2021:
"So, umm...Holy Shit.
With only two features under her belt, Julia Ducournau has not only already established herself as one of the ballsiest, best, and most original directors working right now, but she might be the finest feminist filmmaker on the planet today. "Titane" (which is a film that is so deeply disturbing at times, it would make David Cronenberg queasy) is a truly extraordinary piece of work that is brutal, shocking and, in the end, incredibly beautiful...it is also by far, the best film I've seen all year."
Two things: I like "Titane" even more now than I did then. However, I wrote the above before I saw "Drive My Car," which turned out to be the best film of that year.
2) POSSESSOR
Well, the apple does not fall from the tree because David Cronenberg's son, Brandon, wrote and directed this amazing film.
It takes place in an alternate 2008, in which an agency uses brain implant technology on people who then go on to commit assassinations and crimes for the government. Of course, there are scary and often gross side effects within the bodies of the agents and complications to their home lives, marriages, etc.
Led by the incredible Andrea Riseborough, the truly outstanding cast includes Sean Bean, Christopher Abbott, and the always amazing Jennifer Jason Leigh (star of David Cronenberg's "eXistenZ"), all doing stellar, brave, and raw work.
It's smart, scary, sexy, disgusting, and sometimes jaw-dropping, and Cronenberg never misses a beat with his brilliant direction. He started off in the shadow of a true master but he stepped confidently out on his own with this great piece of Body Horror.
3) ERASERHEAD
From 1977, this is one of the real granddaddies of the genre, this David Lynch film (his first, and in my opinion, still his best) is a bleak, horrifying, funny, and heartbreaking work.
It tells the sad tale of Henry, a lonely industrial worker (played by the legendary Jack Nance) whose affair with a woman results in the birth of a lizard-like baby, a miserable marriage, insane in-laws, and non-stop nightmares, both real and imagined.
This is Lynch at his most unhinged, creative, and sincere. It is also surrealist cinema of the highest order and the uncompromising vision of a genius.
It's also incredibly gross, loaded with Body Horror tropes and delightfully distorted creatures/characters that are repulsively lovable and unforgettable. I could not believe what I was watching the first time I saw this film. I had to be alone for awhile afterward to let it all sink in.
This is also one of Mel Brooks' favorite movies of all time. When he saw it, he immediately hired Lynch to direct "The Elephant Man," which led to "Dune," which led to "Blue Velvet," and so on. So, yet another reason to love Mel Brooks.
4) SLITHER
Before James Gunn entered the Marvel Universe with the "Guardians of the Galaxy" series and found extraordinary commercial and cultural success there, he was batting around in the horror genre, writing the screenplays for the "Dawn of the Dead" remake and a couple of "Scooby-Doo" films.
His directorial debut was this hilarious, gross, and incredibly entertaining horror comedy about a small South Carolina town invaded by alien creatures that transform humans into grotesque monsters.
This movie is a gross-out riot, and everyone involved is having a blast. The fantastic cast of Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Banks, Tania Saulnier, Gregg Henry, Jenna Fischer, and especially Michael Rooker (who gets to have the most disgusting and awesome creature make-up in the film) all cut loose and go wild.
The movie owes a lot to Cronenberg's "Shivers" and Fred Dekker's "Night of the Creeps," but Gunn acknowledges it all and even makes fun of it — Body Horror at its most fun.
OK, this movie is crazy. I mean, really crazy. I'm talking batshit crazy.
Writer/director/producer Shinya Tsukamoto's 1989 Japanese sci-fi horror film is about as graphic and nightmarish a Body Horror film as you will ever see.
It's about a man who accidentally kills a metal fetishist whose dead spirit turns the man into a maggot-filled hybrid of human, metal, and machine. That's when the fun begins.
Although the film's running time is only 67 minutes, the breakneck pacing, insane editing, and relentless grotesquery make it feel much, much longer.
I love every frame of this crazy-ass movie, but I can understand why people have wanted to punch me in the mouth for recommending it to them.
6) RE-ANIMATOR
The late, great Chicagoan Stuart Gordon wrote and directed this low-budget classic based on the H.P. Lovecraft book. It features some of the most hilarious gross-out scenes and sick characters in the history of horror.
Two young scientists discover a way to resurrect dead bodies, and the disgusting consequences of playing God soon take over.
There are insane transformations, buckets of goo, and lots of wonderful, crazy overacting. Reanimated corpses dine on people's fingers; a dead guy walks around carrying his own decapitated head to traumatize a lovely female student, and there is an insane zombie cat named Rufus.
It all adds up to a stone-cold classic that has gone down in history as one of the best and most outrageous horror films of the 1980s. It features a wonderful cast who have become icons and friends in the horror community.
Jeffery Combs, Bruce Abbott, and especially the lovely Barbara Crampton are regulars on the convention circuit and in the world of horror. Many of the cast and crew would reunite for Gordon's follow-up, the equally crazy "From Beyond," and the director would continue to do terrific work in the genre until his unfortunate death in 2020.
By the way, Stuart Gordon and his wife Carolyn Purdy Gordon founded the Organic Theater, the first home to incredible talents like Joe Mantegna, Dennis Franz, Tom Towles, Mashach Taylor, and David Mamet.
So, that's a lot more than just Body Horror.
I'll be brief.
This is one of the greatest movies ever made, and if you haven't seen it, you should... immediately.
That's it.
8) POSSESSION
This is one of the most challenging and demented films I've ever seen, and the fact that it played in malls and theaters across the country in 1981 is a testament to the kind of risky cinema studios were releasing 45 years ago.
Polish writer/director Andrzej Zulawski's surreal take on a crumbling marriage stars Isabelle Adjani as a wife who suddenly wants a divorce, and Sam Neill (the same year he played the Anti-Christ in "The Final Conflict") as the tortured, jealous, and baffled husband. I have simplified the plot here, but it involves infidelity, spies, beatings, private investigators, estranged sons, a descent into madness, and, finally, some very serious Body Horror.
The true highlight of this horror masterpiece is Adjani's absolutely stunning, brave, insane, and incredible performance. She has never been better. She is completely fearless in this madness, and her work here must be seen to be believed—and even then, you might not believe it.
Neill is also amazing and amazingly weird in this film, doing some of the riskiest stuff he has ever done on screen. There are extended sequences in which he begs, pleads, cries, screams, laughs, and wanders around like a lunatic, inspiring laughter and complete blissful confusion.
Then, there is the final third of the movie, when Adjani's deep secret is revealed, and the real, true horror begins, and my God, is it good.
All of Body Horror's visceral elements are jack hammered across the screen, and the symbolism and allegory of failed marriage take front and center in the form of a tangible monster.
It is complete madness, and it's pure genius... and again, Isabelle Adjani is extraordinary.
Ken Russell's completely insane acid trip of a movie stars a young William Hurt as a scientist and psychology professor, whose experiments with hallucinogenic drugs and sensory deprivation tanks do all kinds of crazy things to him, the least of which is to turn him into a caveman.
Yeah, this thing is nuts, and I love every single minute of it. Russell's complete disregard for logic, reality, motivation, and even the laws of nature is boldly experimental and almost unheard of in commercial filmmaking. When this movie was unleashed upon the unknowing public in 1980, there wasn't anything like it out there, and there still hasn't been anything like it since.
Writer Paddy Chayefsky hated it so much that he wanted his name removed from the credits and physically threatened Russell. Warner Brothers had no idea how to advertise the thing, so they pumped up the fantasy elements and pushed the freak-out tone, and it worked.
The movie launched Hurt's and Blair Brown's careers, almost ended Russell's, made Charles Haid and Bob Balaban enemies, and featured Drew Barrymore two years before "E.T." It also might hold the record for the fastest and most overlapping incomprehensible dialogue ever featured in a movie that takes place on earth, with apparent earthlings speaking.
The Body Horror in "Altered States" is everywhere, from the crazy time-traveling hallucinations that are loaded with blood, gore, Christ imagery, aliens, strobe effects, crosses, goats, monkeys, sex, nudity, and more, to even the domestic scenes.
This movie's unbelievable special effects makeup features wild and extraordinary transformation sequences with bubbling skin, ripping bodies, glowing veins, giant heads, and much more.
The makeup effects were created and executed by the dream team of the legendary Dick Smith and Rick Baker, while future FX gods Carl Fullerton and Craig Reardon assisted.
A friend of mine dropped acid before watching this movie a second time and claimed that it felt exactly the same as when he watched it straight the first time.... and yes, the acid was good.
10) HATCHING
Like I did for the first film on this list, here is what I posted on social media immediately after seeing this film in 2022:
"Brilliant. F×*king completely insane and outstanding. Those Finnish are nuts.
This movie is a perfect companion piece/double feature with Pixar's "Turning Red," only, you know, leave the Goddamn kids at home. You want a real movie about puberty? Well, here you go.
It is weird, often disgusting, kinda funny, and bloody, exactly like its subject matter, and features an incredible teenage girl performance at the center. The audience I saw it with hated it.... but they are clearly dipshits."
Then, the next night, I posted this about Siiri Solalinna, the lead in the movie:
"Last night, I saw this incredible young actress in an outstanding Finnish horror film called "Hatching," which is a shocking, funny, and often very grotesque parable about puberty, becoming a woman, and maintaining a 'perfect' family relationship.
Imagine a gooey and disturbing version of Pixar's "Turning Red," only better and directed by David Cronenberg, and you're kind of in the ballpark.
It's a great, crazy film, and at its center is 13-year-old Siiri Solalinna, whose remarkable performance (emotionally, physically, mentally) is jaw-dropping on many levels, and it's her film debut! Look her up, and (like the extraordinary Anna Cobb, who you can see right now in her first film, the brilliant "We're All Going to the World's Fair") remember her name, because she's gonna be a star."
Ummm, so.... Solalinna hasn't done anything since.
But the movie is great, she is amazing, and the film is a prime example of fantastic Body Horror.
Wrapping things up, here are a few more titles that didn't quite make the Top 10, but I wanted to mention quickly: "Raw," "Cabin Fever," "Tusk," "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (all versions), and "Splice."
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