At the Cannes Film Festival, David Cronenberg’s dystopian Sci-Fi film, Crimes of the Future, caused some viewers to walk out of the showing in the first five minutes. Contrastingly, those who could stomach it led to a standing ovation at the closing of the film (NY Post).
The film starring Viggo Mortensen, Kristen Stewart, and Léa Seydoux, is based on a world where people have adapted to an environment where there is no pain and surgery has become a public art performance. Crimes of the Future is set in a synthetic environment where Saul Tenser and his partner Caprice are celebrated as celebrity performance artists that utilize Tenser’s organs in their live works of art. (IMDB)
A viewer of the film, Marqois De Sade, a California recording artist and film enthusiast shared his opinion on Crimes of the Future with JAILBIRDS DIGITAL.
Marqois De Sade’s music is known as controversial and experimental art that pushes the limits much like Cronenberg’s imaginative worlds he portrays in film; thus, a film like Crimes of the Future is something the local California artist would naturally gravitate to.
Marqois De Sade describes the film as a world or future where someone like Marina Abramović, Serbian performer, would be celebrated by the masses instead of vilified as she typically is in modern times. Abramović’s art swims in territories of body art, feminism, community experiences and more (MAI).
The California artist analyzes Cronenberg’s latest film as rebelling against one’s own body, the darkness within, by turning that darkness into an evolutionary work of art. Much like Marqois De Sade embraces the darkest parts of him within by manifesting them into his music, Tenser’s character takes the new organs growing inside of him by having them surgically removed by way of live performance. In essence, revealing the darkness within can lead to catharsis, or healing, for the entertainer and the observers of the art.
So what does crime have to do with Crimes of the Future? According to Marqois De Sade, the film has to do with not only crimes against the body but crimes against the environment and natural law; he states, “without giving any spoilers, the crimes of the future, portrayed in this film, are not much different than the crimes of today.”
Join Marqois De Sade and Xosex’s listening party on June 24, 2022 at Twitch to experience their new album “XOM”.
(Crimes of the Future image courtesy of YouTube)
