David Cronenberg's Crash

Claire and Gavia delve into David Cronenberg’s fascinating erotic thriller Crash, based on the novel by J.G. Ballard. Released in 1996, this film stars James Spader as a man who develops a sexual fetish for car crashes. Deborah Kara Unger co-stars as his icily enigmatic wife Catherine, alongside Holly Hunter and Elias Koteas as two new acquaintances who share James’s fetish.

Among other topics, this episode covers Crash’s unique place in the erotic thriller genre, its relationship with Cronenberg’s other films, its mesmerizingly weird cast of characters, and its dramatically divisive release.

Links

Crash’s press conference at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival

"The Killer Inside," J.G. Ballard, The Guardian

"Crash: The Wreck of the Century," Jessica Kiang, Criterion

“‘The movie did explode, and took a lot of people’s heads off as it did so.’ David Cronenberg on ‘Crash’,” 4th Estate

"Beyond the bounds of depravity: an oral history of David Cronenberg’s Crash," Matthew Thrift, BFI

Programme notes for Glasgow Film Theatre’s David Cronenberg season, Claire Biddles.