Ha ha, I’m seein’ double: four Jeremy
Ironses! Yes, it’s Burl, stealing a joke for you to open a review of a picture
made by one of my favourite directors, David Cronenberg, who also made Fast Company, of course, and Stereo too! The movie I’m talking about
today is Dead Ringers, which might
have been better off called Gemini,
as I believe was the original plan! Then they were going to call it Twins, but Ivan Reitman put in the call
and took that title for himself! They settled for borrowing the title of an old
Bette Davis Batty-Old-Dame picture and adding an S to the end! Ha ha!
Now, I used to be a regular attendee of the
Toronto Film Festival! Ha ha, every year I would fly in, take a hotel room with
some equally movie-mad pals, and see as many movies as we could! Back in those
days the grand premieres were held in Ryerson Hall, and, quite by chance, my
friends and I discovered a side door and a passageway that led into the
basement under the theater, from which we could emerge and take seats without
ever buying a ticket! Ha ha, it was great, and very sneaky! And the first movie
we did this for was Dead Ringers!
Yes, le
tout Toronto was there, cheering on the hometown boy in all their furs and
finery! Unfortunately there was a technical issue in which the sound went off
for approximately five minutes! Ha ha, I really felt for Cronenberg during this
time - it’s got to be no fun when the grand premiere of your newest picture
goes wrong! But the problem was soon corrected, and no great harm was done!
I certainly enjoyed the picture, though it
was the start of a new, sui generis
period for a director whose horror and science fiction works I had thoroughly
enjoyed for years! Dead Ringers tells
the story of the Mantle brothers, twin gynecologists both played by Jeremy
Irons from Die Hard With A Vengeance!
Ha ha, the trick effects used to double up on Irons are pretty well flawless,
and the unfussy, dare I say clinical style that comes so naturally to
Cronenberg greatly helps the illusion! Ha ha!
The brothers regularly impersonate one
another, with Elliot the more outgoing and playboy-ish, and Beverly the
shy-boy! But when they get mixed up with a famous actress played by the great Geneviève
Bujold, well known from Tightrope and
The Moderns, their carefully crafted,
deliberately symbiotic lives get churned up like a roughly-poured pousse-café!
Of course things go badly for the Mantle
boys, helped along as they are by the excellent performances of the actor
playing them, and by an exceptionally effective Howard Shore score, and by
truly fine direction from Cronenberg! People, including myself, tend to
remember this as a thoroughgoing drama-movie, and a particularly squirmy one
given the main characters’ profession; but what I noticed this time around was
how funny the picture is! Ha ha, Cronenberg has even said that all of his
movies are fundamentally comedies, and I see now that this is true!
It’s very clever, devious comedy, and
there’s a lot to think about once the movie comes to a close! “She’s an
actress,” Elliot tells Beverly in discussing the Bujold character. “You never
know who she really is!” And the
great irony with which this complaint is buttered is foundational to this fine
picture! Oh sure, it’s got flaws - like, who is that redheaded lady anyway? -
but it still impresses me on multiple levels, and I give Dead Ringers three and a half surprise cameos from non-actor
Stephen Lack!
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