David Cronenberg’s Rabid (1977)
R | Canada | David Cronenberg | English
Picking up where his taboo-busting SHIVERS left off, RABID is the next-level iteration of legendary Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg’s obsession with sexual body horror as a late-nite creature feature.
Former adult film star Marilyn Chambers stars as a woman who, after a motorcycle accident, wakes up in a hospital with new skin and a new appetite. A deranged plastic surgeon (Howard Ryshpan), grafts a huge lesion onto Marilyn’s arm; like a mosquito’s stinger, this new member sucks the blood out of her various sexual conquests. Soon, everyone in Montréal has been turned into a rabid, bloodsucking zombie. As the city transforms into an incubator for gunk-spewing vampires, the ghostly Chambers finds herself at war with her body and the world.
RABID is young Cronenberg firing on all cylinders. Featuring a focused and intense performance from Chambers, clever statements on vanity / greed and a grotesque lil’ beastie that looks like a penis with teeth, RABID is a high-water mark in lysergic horror. This includes the show-stopping scene involving a machine gun and Santa Claus! (Honest: it’s much, much better than it sounds.)
“Cronenberg casts [Chambers] in a different kind of skin flick, and allows her to weaponise her seductive charms and to penetrate those who would do the same to her – all in the service of an animalistic lust (for blood) that is Insatiable…” (Projected Figures)
Friday, January 31
Doors 11:00 pm | Movie 11:30 *Start time subject to change.
Advance tickets $13 HERE | $13 at the door
*Rio Theatre Groupons and passes OK! Please redeem at the door.
*Minors welcome in the balcony. (Rated 18A.) Must be 19+ w/ID for bar service and main floor seating.
RABID (David Cronenberg, 1977 / 18A / 91 mins) After undergoing radical surgery for injuries from a motorcycle accident, a young woman develops a strange phallic growth on her body and a thirst for human blood—the only nourishment that will now sustain her.