Synopsis
Stereo (1969) is David Cronenberg's first feature, and you can watch it online on iFILM. Sixty-five minutes of stark black-and-white science fiction, shot in Canada years before the body horror that made his name.
A handful of university volunteers check into a quiet research institute for a brutal psychological trial. The procedure strips them of speech but opens their minds to telepathy — and then the link between them starts to fracture. Cronenberg drops almost all sync sound; instead of dialogue you get clinical voice-over narration, as if you're reading the case file on the subjects. Ronald Mlodzik, a fixture of the director's earliest work, leads the cast.
You can already feel the obsession that defines later Cronenberg: a mind the body can no longer contain. It's slow, dry, lecture-cold art cinema, and that's the point — required viewing if you want to trace where the director began. Stream Stereo (1969) online on iFILM.
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