Born in Toronto, March 15, 1943, David Cronenberg wasn't your average kid. For example, while most youngsters would be outside playing, David would spend hours watching with rapt attention exactly how a praying mantis devoured a meal. While his parents were, by all accounts normal, they didn't exactly have common, everyday jobs. David's father was a stamp columnist for the Toronto Telegram newspaper and a freelance writer, and his mother a professional pianist. Cronenberg grew up surrounded by books and art. His early interests were fiction and science, and he never saw them as being incompatible. In fact, he went on to study science at the University of Toronto. There he developed an interesting balance between the two. For example, although he felt that no one could really be taught how to write, he also thought that a person would need to be taught science if they wanted to write about science. It was at the U. of T. that David's somewhat insular world expanded when he started to hang out with art students. He would eventually drop science in favor of English. From there it was a relatively short leap, at least for him, into filmmaking.

Cronenberg first thought about making movies because of a friend also named David. David Secter had made an ambitious student feature titled Winter Kept Us Warm (1965), using local people and places that Cronenberg knew. It showed him that making a film didn't have to be complicated and so, in 1966, he directed his first short, Transfer, in which two men talk and eat across a table in a snowy field and end up engaged in a duel in which they flap their neckties at one another. His next film, From the Drain (1967), is about two veterans in a mysterious war who sit in a bathtub until one of them is strangled by a plant that grows out of the drain. Clearly, David Cronenberg was coming from another place. A place no other Canadian director had really bothered to explore.

Cronenberg would go on to form the Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre with Robert Fothergill, Jim Plaxton and Lorne Michaels. Using funds from a grant to make his first serious project, Cronenberg released a sixty-two minute film called Stereo in 1969. He would follow this with Crimes of the Future (1970), which earned him notice in the art film circles.

Cronenberg then went deep into the genre of horror in the 1970s. He would establish a reputation for himself as an original horror master with Shivers (1975), which really launched his career as a writer and director. He followed this with Rabid (1977) and The Brood (1979). While some critic found his films distasteful, some considered him a genre auteur with great artistic vision. In the 1980s, Cronenberg's films explored six themes: the paranormal, the intrusion of visual media, biology, technology, identity and the psychology of delusion. Titles from this era include Scanners (1981) and Videodrome (1983). But with the release of The Dead Zone in 1983, The Fly in 1986 and Dead Ringers in 1988, Cronenberg showed that he was much more than a competent filmmaker. He was able to deliver a quality of filmmaking and storytelling usually not seen within the horror genre and, more importantly, these filmsmarked his emergence as a filmmaker of international status. The Dead Zone, for example, won the 1984 Critic's Award at the Avoriaz Film Festival in France and Dead Ringers won the Grand Prize and 11 Genies including Best Picture, Director and Adapted Screenplay. During this time his career expanded to include directing for television, and that even included directing a few TV commercials. Also, like many directors before him, Cronenberg made the occasional appearance in front of the camera, acting in both his own films and films for other directors.

As his reputation grew, critics began to look at his work differently. If he hadn't been taken very seriously before, Cronenberg entered the 1990s as a force to be reckoned with. His films had changed. While still working within a particular genre, his films pushed out beyond the usually narrow aspect reserved for horror into the broader realm of fantasy. As a "bankable" director Cronenberg was able to access larger budgets and his films reflected the higher production values of mainstream movies. Examples include his 1992 film, Naked Lunch, based on the William S. Burroughs novel, M Butterfly released in 1993, and Crash, released in 1996. Crash was sufficiently "out there" in its approach, plot and story telling that the Cannes Film Festival found it necessary to invent a Special Jury Prize specifically to recognize his unique filmmaking style. He ended the decade with the 1999 film eXistenZ. Also in 1999 Cronenberg was asked to head up the Cannes Film Festival jury. He had come a very long way from those first short experimental films at the University of Toronto.

Cronenberg entered the new millennium with no sign of slowing down after more than 30 years of filmmaking. Spider had its North America premiere as a Gala Presentation at the 2002 Toronto International Film Festival. It went on to be given the festival's Best Canadian Feature Film Award. Cronenberg was named Best Director at the 2003 Genies for his work on Spider. A long-time favorite in France, Cronenberg, who had previously been given a chevalier des arts et lettres, was elevated to the level of officier in a special presentation by Philippe Guelluy, the French ambassador to Canada. His 2005 film A History of Violence was selected for compeitition at the Cannes Film Festival and opened to excellent reviews after playing at the Toronto International Film Festival. A solid piece of work, it has been said it is his most "American" film yet. By that, most people mean it is clear David Cronenberg set his sights on making his own kind of movie but also reached out to the mainstream movie-going public. Because of the rules governing what constitutes a Canadian movie, A History of Violence did not compete in the Genie Awards but Josh Olson was nominated for writing in the Adapted Screenplay category at the Oscars^® and William Hurt was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

Cronenberg's 2007 film, Eastern Promises, built on decades of experience and is his most polished film yet. BBC News placed Eastern Promises on their year-end review of the Top 10 films released in 2007. According to the website, Box Office Mojo, the film had pulled in more than 40-million dollars worldwide in its first three months after being released in mid-September. Eastern Promises recieved nominations and/or awards from The Golden Globes, The British Film Awards, the Academy Awards and the Genies where it walked away with seven of the coveted Canadian film awards in early 2008.

David Cronenberg has achieved what few other Canadian directors can claim. He has been able to build an international reputation while remaining solidly fixed within the Canadian landscape. Blessed by a vision that has been remarkably constant, he has been able to build success upon success. Looking back over his career to date, it is easy to see that while he remained within a relatively narrow field, each outing was a new direction, a new expression, a new experiment. We can only hope his unique approach to combining art and science continues.

Of all the accolades available to famous filmmakers, David Cronenberg has achieved the highest: an international legion of fans eagerly awaiting his next film.


Go to David Cronenberg's Filmography