Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786302038019
Format: NTSC
ISBN: 6302038014
Label: Lions Gate/Vestron
Manufacturer: Lions Gate/Vestron
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Lions Gate/Vestron
Release Date: 2002-01-01
Running Time: 87
Studio: Lions Gate/Vestron
Theatrical Release Date: 1976-07-06

"If this picture doesn't make you scream and squirm, you should see a psychiatrist--quick!" shouts the film's trailer. This time the hyperbole is right. David Cronenberg's debut feature, and Canada's first domestic horror film, is an ingeniously engineered slasher of thoroughly modern horror that, like George Romero's Night of the Living Dead, charts a social breakdown by tearing through our most intrinsic taboos. A genetically engineered designer parasite--part aphrodisiac, part venereal disease--created by a modern-day mad scientist escapes into a colorless, self-contained apartment complex and goes searching for hosts. This monstrous parasite multiplies and invades the alienated occupants, turning them into a pack of id-driven sex maniacs. Cronenberg's suffocating vision of modern life turns his budgetary limitations--dreary, bland sets, flat lighting, and numb performances--into a severe portrait of society out of touch with its physical and emotional existence. Cronenberg pushed the boundaries of gore in 1974, but more insidious is the way he pushes the boundaries of behavior: under the influence of this invasive disease, families turn to incest and murder, strangers sexually assault the helpless, and finally they band together as a pack of bloodthirsty, libido-driven animals. That taboo-breaking display still has the power to get under your skin. The film has also been released under the titles The Parasite Murders and They Came from Within. Cult horror icon Barbara Steele costars. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Rating:
Summary: THANKS CRONENBERG FOR THE NIGHTMARES
Comment: SHIVERS was the movie that FREAKED me out when I was a kid.
I saw the movie in 76 on a triple bill with SQUIRM and BUG.
SHIVERS came on last and did not disappoint! It all starts
with a Doctor trying to bust a door open on a young teenage girl
the Doctor breaks the door down and strangles the girl. Next
he strips her down naked and puts her on the table takes a scalpel
and starts to slice down her abdomen,he than pours in her stomach a
acid, walks away and takes the scalpel on himself by cutting his throat.
Whats not explained at first is why did this Doctor do that? Well
later in the movie it is explained that the Doctor is a dirty old man
and likes his teenage girls. The Doctor develops a parasite that
makes men/women have sex no matter with whom for long period of times.
David exposed HORROR to me at a very young age(6 yrs.old) and though
this movie does not have a chainsaw maniac or a 11 yr. old girl
that can impersonate a owl it has HORROR for the psyche! To get back
to the story of the film the sexual parasites go from person to person
through their mouth and once it has you you are forever a sexual zombie
a SEXBIE so to speak. This movie is very influenced by Night of the
Living Dead. All your heroes in the film are trapped inside The Hotel
and all your heroes either die or become SEXBIE'S one by one till
you have only one actor left who looks dead-on like Chuck Norris
from Return of the Dragon! He also gets it in the end(SPOILER) till
there is no one left in the Hotel to attack. They all get in their
cars to drive off to other places and the D.J. on the radio says
the all to famous...PEOPLE ARE ATTACKING THEIR LOVE ONES,STRANGERS
ANIMALS??? LOCK UP YOUR DOORS DON'T TALK TO ANYONE AND-AND THERE
TRYING TO GET THROUGH HERE IN THE STUDIO FIND HELP BEFORE IT'S TO
LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRGGG! I really love this movie and yes it is
VERY low budget and the parasites look like Chicken Strips from a restaurant but it has a EERIE look to it,I still remember the feeling
I had when I first saw this and the one actor who looked like a deranged
Tim Allen with his stomach smoking from acid and blood in his mouth
giving me the CREEPS! Also the scene of the two little girls acting
like dogs complete with collars around their necks as Dad is walking them
and the scene of the hero locking himself in a room just to have the
lights on behind him turn on and a very old man and a very young girl
stand up the old man says to the hero of the movie..HAVE YOU MET
MY GRANDDAUGHTER ERICA? (starts to french kiss her) I JUST LOVE
MY GRANDDAUGHTER ERICA........AGHHHHHHHHHHHHH! FREAKED ME OUT AT AGE
SIX! SHIVERS is Cronenburg's first movie and anyone who loves HORROR
should know that Canada man Cronie. I recommend SHIVERS to all,just
don't watch it with a sibling...YOU WILL FEEL DISTURBED!

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Another Cronenberg classic!!!
Comment: I finally picked up this DVD at a Used DVD store and I was very happy that I did. I am an avid Cronenberg fan and loved this movie. It is a very twisted horror fest that has a very dark side. It is a cross with zombie movies and Cronenberg's Rabid. The story is very believable and the gore is over the top for it's time. I can't believe that no one wanted to produce this movie when Cronenberg originally wrote it. This one is a must see for all Cronenberg fans!!!!

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Customer Rating:
Summary: "I just know you'll like my daughter..."
Comment: The first feature film to come from visionary director David Cronenberg, Shivers still manages to pack enough shocks and social commentary under it's horiffic story to make it relevant today. When invading parasites begin to infest and turn their human hosts into depraved and violent sexual predators, the few uneffected in a high rise apartment building do what they can to survive. Low budget to it's core and primitive in it's presentation, Shivers packs a punch thanks to Cronenberg's inventive and groundbreaking story. Heavy with metaphor and bearing many resemblances to Night of the Living Dead (particularly the final scenes when all the infected band together as a pack), Shivers ends up proving to be a wildly twisted and blood soaked beginning from one of the most innovative directors to come out of the genre in the past few decades. If you've never seen Shivers and are a Cronenberg fan, try to check it out if you can find it; you won't be disappointed, and you'll get to see one of the true modern masters of the horror genre display some early brilliance.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Movie Vhs- They Came From Within
Comment: The VHS tape worked fine. Dust cover showed signs of wear. Product came from rental store, so that's to be expected. However the movie I saw was not the original...like it was when I saw it in 1974. Scenes had been edited, or cut out completly. The scenes cut were the 'steamier' ones. Obviously some uptight censor got hold of this film after I had seen the original in 1974. Because of the cuts the movie was hard to follow, and lost the parts of the film that made it 'interesting'. Bad flick!

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Customer Rating:
Summary: They're in the Mood for Love...
Comment: Like all ultra-luxury urban high-rises, and every single square inch of Manhattan real estate, the Starliner Towers has a problem: a Bug problem.

Shot on a shoestring budget and in a whirlwind 15 days in Montreal, "Shivers" (also known as "They Came from Within") is Canadian horror visionary and all-around Creepy Guy David Cronenberg's astounding, jaw-dropping little gem about the end of the world, in which humanity doesn't go out with a Bang or a Whimper, but more of a Moan.

But let's get something out of the way right now: David Cronenberg is a genius and, for my money, one of the top 3 horror film directors *ever*. And while it's certainly useful to view "Shivers" as a preview of coming attractions---without a doubt, it's amazing what the young Cronenberg was able to pull off under severe budgetary, time, and talent limitations---the movie stands on its own as a ground-breaking little nugget of unflinching grue that burrows under your skin and truly disturbs.

Things break down quickly in "Shivers", which is about a medical experiment gone horribly wrong, and the terrible toll it takes on the residents of a luxury island apartment complex outside Montreal---and from there the world.

The film's mad scientist (a nice turn by Fred Doederlein, who pops up again as the yoga master in "Scanners") wants to produce designer parasites that can be introduced into a body, devour a failing organ, and 'become' that organ, thus helping its host at the cost of a little blood.

But wouldn't ya know it, his first experiment Annabelle(a fetching Kathy Graham) refuses to play along with the Doc's good intentions, chiefly because the parasite has two complications: 1)within a few hours it turns its victim's mind to mush, and 2)it also has the unfortunate side-effect of making the subject a ravening sexual psychopath.

In the fim's shocking opening sequences, the Good Doctor brutally tries to abort his little extracurricular activity, but Annabelle has been a popular girl around the Starliner apartments, and faster than you can say "sick building syndrome" the little parasites, which look like a phallic combination of extra-large garden slug and Jimmy Dean sausage, are going a-roving through the apartment building in search of victims.

And faster than the tenants can say "the check's in the mail", they've been converted into a legion of slug-infested serial rapists looking for love in all the wrong places.

It may very well have been that Cronenberg's limitations forced him to adopt a style that was so sterile, brutal, and overlit that the film couldn't help being brutal and startling: from an infected old woman groaning from behind her door to a startled delivery man "I'm hungry...for LOVE", to an avid slug crawling up an elderly lady's walker, to the horrible death of Dr. Lenski, to the wicked elevator infection scene, to the part where screen goddess Barbara Steele is infected by one of the nasty parasites *in her bathtub* (ewww!), Cronenberg keeps up the pressure and ratchets the horror level up so high you feel your brain will pop. You haven't seen ghoulishly creepy until you've watched Allan Colman pleading and talking with a nest of parasites that have been setting up shop in his stomach. Grisly stuff.

Technically this is an average DVD. It could very well be that the movie was shot in a 1:33:1 aspect ratio, in which case the full-screen format is appropriate, but the sound here is atrocious. The extras here, including a theatrical trailer and an illuminating, goofy interview with Cronenberg, are pretty spare, so let's hope someone gets around to releasing this creepshow with the quality treatment it deserves.

Yes, "Shivers" foreshadows a deliciously cringe-inducing career---but for sheer skin-crawling nastiness, it has yet to be surpassed.

JSG

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