The way Hobbes designed those things, they get out of hand pretty fast.
Hot on the heels of The Model Couple, the time seemed ripe for me to revisit David Cronenberg's Shivers, which also takes place in a state-of-the-art apartment complex with all the amenities included. The difference is the experiments that take place in the Starliner Towers are much more insidious, even if they're also ostensibly meant to be for the benefit of all mankind. Made in 1975, Shivers was Cronenberg's first commercial feature and it definitely looks like the work of an artist who had yet to hone his craft, but anybody could tell he was a major talent destined for great things -- that is, if they could look past the disgusting, turd-shaped parasites that drive its plot.
As a matter of fact, unpleastness abounds in Shivers, which opens with what looks like a violent sexual assault by an older man on a teenage girl that is cross-cut with scenes of a couple being shown around the place by the manager (Ronald Mlodzik, star of Cronenberg's two previous experimental features), unaware of some of things that go on there. Then we're introduced to testy insurance man Alan Migicovsky, who's plagued by chronic stomach pains and is completely dismissive of his concerned wife (Susan Petrie), who turns to a friend (the always-welcome Barbara Steele) for support. Meanwhile, the apparent sexual assault takes a deadly turn for both parties as the man strangles the girl, carries out some impromptu tabletop surgery on her, and slits his own throat. That's where our nominal hero, the director of the Starliner's medical clinic (Paul Hampton), enters the picture. I say "nominal" because while he uncovers all the clues he needs to figure out what's going on, he doesn't put them together in time to stop or even slow the spread of the parasite, which instantly raises the libido of anybody who gets infected with it.
Some of those clues are provided by the dead man's partner (Joe Silver), who reveals that they were working on a revolutionary organ-transplant experiment, which is precisely the sort of thing that always goes horrifically wrong in a Cronenberg film. And Hampton is so preoccupied with piecing them together that he doesn't even notice when his nurse (Lynn Lowry) undresses right in front of him. (They're romantically involved, though, so it's not like that isn't anything he hasn't seen before.) Before long, there are roving bands of oversexed maniacs prowling the Starliner's hallways and everybody -- men, women, children, senior citizens -- is fair game. Even the director gets in on the act, playing one of the sex-crazed hosts stalking Hampton, who is the last remaining holdout. Appropriately enough, his conversion takes place after he has been baptized. Only then do they take the show on the road. And sure enough, it wouldn't be long before audiences knew the name David Cronenberg. He was the one who made them shiver all over.