Also see Schlockcast: The Fly & The Fly II
There are classics and then, on very rare occasions, there are classics born of classics. The original version of The Fly (1958) featured the great Vincent Price as the brother-in-law of the first hapless scientist who accidently becomes all-too-acquainted with a common housefly. Nearly 30 years later, the fiendishly perverted David Cronenberg put a completely different spin on George Langelaan‘s original short story. Dave injects into his screenplay healthy doses of pseudo-science, eroticism and good old fashion gore.
The movie: Seth Brundle (the ever-twitchy Jeff Goldblum) is a geekazoid inventor who manages to pick up Geena Davis, er, Veronica “Ronnie” Quaife at a party. Ronnie is a journalist looking for a story, and Seth, well he’s hoping to impress her with his enormous pods. Before she can split, he zaps one of her silk stockings from one telepod to another, and her eyes get big as Pulitzer medals. She high-tails it to the slimeball editor of Particle magazine, who also happens to be her ex, and who also happens to think she’s been con’d. Seth scoops her up and the two begin a tawdry romance amid his slightly-mad-scientist goingsons. It seems he can’t teleport living objects without them coming out on the other end looking like road pizza. After roasting its brother, Seth successfully beams a baboon across the room, and he and Ronnie giddily dance around. But she abruptly weirds out about her ex-boyfriend — that editor guy — and runs off. Brundle gets drunk and talks to the monkey a bunch. Then strips nekkid and decides to teleport himself before having the ape checked out. And as anyone knows, a fly zips into the pod with him and BINGO! Ya got yourself a helluva creature feature. There’s stuff in this thing that’ll make your skin crawl. My Vomit Meter just swirls around in circles during a couple of scenes. And what’s REAL shocking is that YOU CARE about the disgusting beast Seth becomes. Goldblum’s metamorphosis is so powerful that it earned Chris Walas and Stephan Dupuis an Oscar for best makeup. It’s one of the few remakes that rivals its original, and arguably David Cronenberg‘s best work.
Notables: No breasts. One corpse. 21 gallons goo. One beast. Barfly diddling. Arm snapping. Inside-out baboon. Gratuitous “high-tech” computer graphics. Wall crawling. One giant maggot. Teeth tumble. Jaw rolls. Ear tumbles. Much-o digestive-acid fu.
Quotables: Snotty, but sexy wanna-be journalist Ronnie (Davis), doesn’t think much of Brundle’s work, “Designer phone booths? Very cute.” But she winds up sleeping with him anyway, “How can you keep going? You can’t have any fluid left in your body!” And later regrets it, warning his next squeeze to “Be afraid. Be very afraid.” Seth asks Ronnie out, “I’ve come here to say one magic word to you — CHEESEBURGER!” But later, something doesn’t agree with him and he wants her to bug off, “I’m saying I’m an insect who dreamt he was a man, and loved it. But now, the dream is over, and the insect is awake. I’m saying I’ll hurt you if you stay.” One of my favorite film sleazeballs, John Getz as Stathis Borans, can’t take Ronnie’s “NO!” for an answer, “What about sex? I’m not saying love or affection. Just stress relieving sex. You and me.”
Time codes: Seth’s serenade (4:30). The first big gross-out effect (18:15). Brundle’s fashion sense (21:00). The critical mistake (34:05). Marathon nookie (45:20). Arm rasslin’ (50:20). Seth starts falling apart (57:30). “Mmmmm! Yummie donuts!” (1:05:10). Brundle Museum of Natural History (1:15:14). The final transformation of Brundlefly (1:28:00).
