Running time: 98 minutes
Starring: Ralph Fiennes, Miranda Richardson, Gabriel Byrne, Lynn Redgrave, John Neville
Rating 7 out of 10
David Cronenberg shuns the splatter and gore of his cult horror movies (Scanners, Videodrome) for psychological terror in Spider, a powerful and moving tale of mental illness adapted from Patrick McGrath's novel of the same name. It's a difficult and challenging film, taking place largely inside the warped mind of a broken man, whose memory is tainted by anguish and resentment.
Dennis Cleg (Ralph Fiennes), aka Spider, is a schizophrenic released into the community, to take up lodgings at a halfway house in his old neighbourhood run by the imperious Mrs Wilkinson (Lynn Redgrave). The other residents live in fear from her tirades and drift into mental decay, and Dennis reluctantly follows suit, striking up a friendship of sorts with the fatherly Terrence (John Neville).
During his expeditions around the East End, Dennis reminisces about the traumatic events of his childhood, including the dysfunctional relationship with his abusive father Bill (Gabriel Byrne), whom he suspected of murdering his mother (Miranda Richardson).
Fantasy and reality blur as Dennis struggles to make sense of his tortured past, nudging the former patient ever closer towards a mental breakdown.
Cronenberg's fluid and unobtrusive direction allows the performances to shine, and he generates a creepy atmosphere with claustrophobic camerawork and muted colours.
Mrs Wilkinson's boarding house is a vision of peeling wallpaper and mildew-stained dreams, where ghosts of Dennis's past haunt every damp corridor. The director also conjures some striking imagery - shattered mirrors, a network of twine criss-crossing young Dennis's bedroom - to illustrate the spider motif and the fracturing of the protagonist's fragile mind.
Fiennes is terrific, talking to himself in an incomprehensible mumble for the majority of the film, then exploding into life as his reminisces become frightening real. There's a heartbreaking sadness in his character's eyes which speaks volumes. Richardson offers strong support, initially playing the dead mother, then adopting the guises of Mrs Wilkinson and a ballsy prostitute as Dennis's perception of reality becomes irrevocably distorted. Byrne is suitably chilling as a father who puts his physical needs ahead of everything and anyone else and Redgrave is wickedly demented for the few minutes she is on screen.
Spider is a stylish descent into one man's madness.
