The Shrouds, David Cronenberg’s newest technology-driven body horror film, premiered Monday night at the Cannes Film Festival, highlighting one man’s grief over the loss of his wife.
The Shrouds is a film about death, dying, and the burial process fused with tech, and it hits differently. I feel David Cronenberg, who wrote and directed The Shrouds, nailed certain aspects of his lead character’s grief process. Now I know why: The film has some autobiographical elements based on the loss of Cronenberg’s own wife.
As a fan of the technology-based Cronenberg film Crimes Of The Future, which debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in 2022, I enjoyed the technology aspect of the story The Shrouds. The story allows mourners to see their loved ones via video feed after the burial process, glaring light on the unknown that haunts mourners universally.
Vincent Kassel, as Karsh, is obsessed with the body of his late wife, which ignites his global burial tech brand and, at the heart, gives him the ability to watch her (and other clients) deteriorate so she isn’t “alone.”
Her surviving sister, who looks just like her, becomes a temptation along with her disgruntled ex-husband, who becomes a possible conspirator when plugs are pulled, and graves are vandalized, along with Karsh’s wife’s doctor/ex-boyfriend who goes missing just like her body parts leading up to her death.
Truly loved ‘Crimes of the Future’ which debuted at Cannes in 2022. ‘The Shrouds’ a film based on death, dying and the burial process fused with tech, hits different and I feel David Cronenberg nailed certain aspects of the grief process of his lead character. Now I know why, the… pic.twitter.com/mi1nRwc4gE
— Nikki Fowler @Cannes (@NikkiFowler28) May 20, 2024
There’s a lot going on, and there is more good than bad, with some awkward sex scenes, a Snapchat-ish AI assistant with a leak, and dialogue that was not that enjoyable. These factors caused me to respectfully lose a bit of interest from mid-to-end.
The Shrouds premiered at Cannes to a standing ovation for the cast and filmmakers.
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