Brood - La covata malefica

David Cronenberg has always possessed a flair for unique and disturbing visions infused with the trimmings of a genre that can be best referred to as "biohorror." "The Brood," his tale of hideous mutant children who do the bidding of mentally disturbed Nola (Samantha Eggar) under the care of new-wave psychiatrist Dr. Raglan (Oliver Reed, with a quietly sophisticated Peter Cushing sensibility), is buffered by fine performances that veer away from camp. In a way, one of Cronenberg's achievements is writing such outlandish material and making it entirely convincing and visceral, as opposed to merely settling on B-movie cheesiness, which I admire. As is the case with most Cronenberg films, here 'reality' is made the most atypical place where man can reside, and the clever script is always one careful step ahead of the audience.

7/10

The Brood is undoubtedly the most personal movie Cronenberg ever made : we all know the film describes Cronenberg's vision of his own divorce (and the custody of his daughter Cassandra) ; at that time, his then-wife belonged to what he thought was a cult and he did kidnap his own daughter in order to protect her. Thus The Brood is full of rage, vengeance and death wish… It is a truly frightening story and, in its own way, a candid vision of one's personal tragedy. It seems to be a tale from the Grimm brothers, and, at the same time, a reflection on the powerful link between body and spirit. The script is surprisingly complex and rich, even if, in the end, there is definitely something childish in the movie, but in a positive way: the childish belief that "thoughts can kill" only tempered by the final sequence, when we understand that this little girl, so cruelly abused, will eventually reproduce what her mother developed. The image of this mother (Samantha Eggar at her best, revealing her tortured body that evokes a Roman goddess) is one of the most terrifying one in world cinema. The Brood is a key to understand one of the Cronenberg's major themes: the uncanny… How what is closest to us, family, mother, grandparents, might suddenly become the ultimate horror. What frightens us is not outlandish or alien, on the contrary, it's always part of our intimate universe (as in Videodrome).

Sometimes writers and directors just have to be given a chance to be boring. Some stories just can not give you the goods from beginning to end. The brood is a film that cannot put all the cards on the table right away. Cronenberg is as always exploring issues within the horror format that are usually ignored for simple baseless gore. While the plot is not going to make a lick of sense to someone without a dark imagination it is very inventive.

I can't say for sure but serious horror fans may note that the later half of this film could easily stand along many the stories in Clive Barker's books of blood. Cronenberg I think can take some credit in inspiring later works from the horror prince who would explore a lot of these issues with a little more supernatural zeal. Isn't great that Cronenberg played a serial killer for Barker in Nightbreed!

The film is slow out of the gates for sure but Oliver Reed puts in a strange and compelling performance as the weird doctor. Samatha Eggar was very brave in her performce as the brood's disturbed mother. While some of the scenes with the brood children alone in the world look silly like everything else in the film there is a pay-off in the last half hour.

If you give up early on this film you will really miss out because the last half hour is where cronenberg packs everything in. Truly vile gore, full on madness of characters and spine chilling terror for the daughter.

For serious horror fans only.

One of Cronenberg's best films! It has some moments that will stick with you for a while. When the brood first appears and the beatings begin, I was not only disturbed by them, but the way that their faces look was burned onto my brain. I once read that Cronenberg calls this film his KRAMER VS. KRAMER. I think that's very interesting. He's taken the pain that he went through in his own life and manifested it in the physical form of these creatures. I find this kind of creativity to be associated only with some of the more visionary contemporary filmmakers. Cronenberg is that, there is no question. Performances by the late great Oliver Reed, Samantha Eggar and Art Hindle are perfect for the film. It is scary and disturbing and should be seen by all horror film fans. I find it to be a sadly neglected classic.

I really enjoyed David Cronenberg's film called The Brood. It is about a woman who is being cared for by an eccentric psychologist called Dr. Raglan(Oliver Reed). Who uses theatrical techniques to breach the psychological blocks in his patients. When their six year old daughter comes back from a visit with her mother and is covered with bruises the father Frank Carveth attempts to stop his his wife from seeing their daughter. But the psychologist Dr. Raskin will not stop his wife from seeing the girl. whilst this is happening his daughter's teacher is is attacked by two strange looking deformed children. Her father starts to believe that it is to do with Dr. Rankin and a psychotherapy cult which he may have something to do with it. This film was quite disturbing at times. I thought that Oliver Reed played a very good part in the film.