Development
The basis for Videodrome came from David Cronenberg's childhood. Cronenberg used to pick up American television signals from Buffalo, New York, late at night after Canadian stations had gone off the air, and worry he might see something disturbing not meant for public consumption.[9] As Cronenberg explained, "I've always been interested in dark things and other people's fascinations with dark things. Plus, the idea of people locking themselves in a room and turning a key on a television set so that they can watch something extremely dark, and by doing that, allowing themselves to explore their fascinations."[10] Cronenberg watched Marshall McLuhan, who O'Blivion was based on, and McLuhan later taught at the University of Toronto while Cronenberg attended it although he never took any of McLuhan's classes.[11][12]
Cronenberg's first exploration of themes of the branding of sex and violence and media impacting people's reality was writing a treatment titled Network of Blood in the early 1970s; its premise was a worker for an independent television company (who would become Max Renn in Videodrome) unintentionally finding, in the filmmaker's words, "a private television network subscribed to by strange, wealthy people who were willing to pay to see bizarre things."[10] He later planned the story to be told from the main character's first-person perspective, showcasing a duality between how insane he looks to other people and how he himself perceives a different reality in his head.[10] Concepts similar to Network of Blood's were further explored in a 1977 episode of the CBC Television series Peep Show Cronenberg directed, named "The Victim."[10] The film's fictional station CIVIC-TV was modeled on the real-life Toronto television station CITY-TV, which was known for broadcasting pornographic content and violent films in its late-night programming bloc The Baby Blue Movie.[13][14]
Victor Snolicki, Dick Schouten, and Pierre David of Vision 4, a company taking advantage of Canada's tax shelter policies, aided Cronenberg in the film's financing.[15] Vision 4 dissolved after Schouten's death and reorganized into Filmplan International which funded Scanners.[16] Solnicki, David, and Claude Héroux formed Filmplan II which gave financial backing to Videodrome. This was the last film Cronenberg made under Canada's film tax shelter policy.[17]
Cronenberg's increased reputation made it easier for his projects to get produced, leading to the film's $5.5 million budget, more interest from studios and producers, and a larger number of interested actors to choose from.[18] After the box office success of Scanners, Cronenberg turned down the chance of directing Return of the Jedi, having had no desire to direct material produced by other filmmakers.[19] Cronenberg met with David in Montreal to discuss ideas for a new film, with the former pitching two ideas, one of them being Videodrome.[20]
Cronenberg started writing the first draft of Videodrome in January 1981, and, as with first drafts of Cronenberg's prior projects, included many parts not featured in the final cut to make it more acceptable for audiences; this included Renn having an explosive grenade as a hand after he chops off his flesh gun during a hallucination, Renn and Nicki melting, via a kiss, into an object that then melts an on-looker, and five other characters besides Barry also dying of cancer.[18] Cronenberg admits that he was worried that the project would be rejected by Filmplan due to the excessive violent content of an early draft, but it was approved, with Claude Héroux joking that the movie would get a triple X rating.[20][17] Although talent for the film was attracted using the first draft, alterations were made constantly from pre-production to post-production.[18]
Accumulation of the cast and crew started in the summer of 1981 in Toronto, with most of the supporting actors being local performers of the city.[18] Videodrome's three producers, David, Claude Héroux and Victor Solnicki, suggested James Woods for the role of Max Renn; they unsuccessfully tried to attach him to another film they produced, Models (1982).[18] Woods was a fan of Rabid (1977) and Scanners, and met Cronenberg in Beverly Hills for the part; Cronenberg liked the fact that Woods was very articulate in terms of delivery,[9] and Woods appreciated the filmmaker's oddball style as well as being a "good controversialist" with "a lot of power."[18] Cronenberg doubled for Woods in the scene where Max puts on the Videodrome helmet since the actor was afraid of getting electrocuted.[9] Co-star Debbie Harry was recommended by David, and Cronenberg cast her after viewing her two times in Union City (1980) and a Toronto audition.[18] She had never had such a large part before, and said that the more experienced Woods gave her a number of helpful suggestions.[21]
Filming
The film was shot in Toronto from 27 October to 23 December 1981, on a budget of $5,952,000 (equivalent to $17,026,327 in 2021), with the financing equally coming from Canada and the United States. 50% of the film's budget came from Universal.[22] The initial week of filming being devoted to videotaping various monitor inserts. These included the television monologues of Professor Brian O'Blivion, as well as the Videodrome torture scenes and the soft-core pornographic programs Samurai Dreams and Apollo & Dionysus.[23] The video camera used for the monitor scenes was a Hitachi SK-91.[24] The film's cinematography was handled by Mark Irwin, who was very uncomfortable with doing the monitor scenes; he was far more experienced with composing shots for regular film cameras than videotapes, disliked the flat television standards of lighting and color, and couldn't compose his shots privately as all of the film crew watched the monitors as the shots were being set up.[24] Cronenberg stated that Videodrome was the first time that he fired a crew worker due to an incident between a hairdresser and Harry.[25]
The Samurai Dreams short was filmed in half a day without any audio recorded at a rented spot at a Global TV studio in Toronto, and lasted five minutes longer than what ended up in the final film.[24]
Three different endings were filmed. The ending used in the final film, wherein Max shoots himself on the derelict ship, was James Woods' idea.[26] One of the initial intentions for the ending was to include an epilogue after the suicide, wherein Max, Bianca, and Nicki appear on the set of Videodrome. Bianca and Nicki are shown to have chest slits like Max, from which grotesque, mutated sex organs emerge.[26] Another ending featured an orgy between Bianca, Max, and Nicki after Max shoots himself and sex-organs were designed for the scene, but Cronenberg decided to remove the scene.[27]
Effects
Rick Baker, who worked on the effects of An American Werewolf in London, did the effects for the film. However, his desired six months of preparation was reduced to two months and less effects were created due to a reduced budget.[28]
One of the scenes cut from the script showed Max and Nicki's faces melting together while kissing and going across the floor to a bystander's leg and melting him.[27]
Michael Lennick served as special video effects supervisor. To create the breathing effects of the television set that Max interacts with, Frank C. Carere utilized an air compressor with valves hooked to a piano keyboard that he himself operated. The undulating screen of the television set was created using a video projector and a sheet of rubbery dental dam. Baker stated that "I knew we would need a flexible material ... we tested with a weather balloon first, stretching it over a frame the size of a TV screen, and pushed a hand through it to see how far it stretched, and then we rear-projected on it."[23] Betamax videotape cassettes were used as items to be inserted into Max's stomach slit, because VHS cassettes were too large to fit the faux abdominal wound.[29] Woods found the stomach slit uncomfortable,[26] and after a long day of wearing it, vented, "I am not an actor anymore. I'm just the bearer of the slit!"[21] Baker's original concept for Max's flesh gun featured eyes, mouth and foreskin, which Cronenberg found to be "too graphic". The cancer effects caused by Max's flesh gun went through various tests, with some tests having the face of the victim being distorted through the use of solvents, but Baker decided against this upon learning that his mentor, Dick Smith, had recently used the same technique in Spasms.[23] Baker settled on having the cancer tumors burst out from the body of Barry Convex, with his crew operating a dummy underneath the set. Lennick devised effects such as having the image of the Videodrome television set distort whenever Max would whip it through the use of a device which he called the "Videodromer", and glitch and twitch effects related to Max's visions through the Videodrome helmet, but these effects were scrapped due to budget and time concerns.[23][9][30]
Music
An original score was composed for Videodrome by Cronenberg's close friend, Howard Shore.[31] The score was composed to follow Max Renn's descent into video hallucinations, starting out with dramatic orchestral music that increasingly incorporates, and eventually emphasizes, electronic instrumentation. To achieve this, Shore composed the entire score for an orchestra before programming it into a Synclavier II digital synthesizer. The rendered score, taken from the Synclavier II, was then recorded being played in tandem with a small string section.[32] The resulting sound was a subtle blend that often made it difficult to tell which sounds were real and which were synthesized.
The soundtrack was also released on vinyl by Varèse Sarabande, and was re-released on compact disc in 1998. The album itself is not just a straight copy of Shore's score, but a remix. Shore has commented that while there were small issues with some of the acoustic numbers, "on the whole I think they did very well".[32]
Editing
Cronenberg stated that the first test screening of a 72-75 minute cut of the film was "the most disastrous screening you can imagine". He and editor Ronald Sanders "thought we had cut it really tight, but it was totally incomprehensible that you didn't even know that Max Renn worked at Civic TV, I'd cut out all the footage that explained that".[33][34]
The MPAA requested multiple edits to the film. Bob Remy, the head of Universal Pictures, also suggested removing the scene in Samurai Dreams showing the dildo. Cronenberg was confused by Remy's suggestion as the "MPAA didn't even ask me to cut that. Why is he asking me to cut that". Thom Mount told Cronenberg that it was due to Remy having "a problem with cocks".[35] The film's runtime was 87 minutes and 18 seconds in Canada and the United States, but was 15 seconds longer in the international version.[22]
Cronenberg was critical of edits Universal Pictures performed on the film without request from the MPAA.[36]
