Surprisingly touching

Rating: 8/10 (24 September 2011)

I'm not, nor have I ever been, a fan of body horror or gross-out horror; true horror, to me, is the kind that relies on suspense and tension. I make an exception with David Cronenberg; even when he gives in to full-on gore, he does so with his own unique vision and spark.
The Fly is not quite an example of that; it's much more commercially oriented, much less personal and original than earlier Cronenberg pieces like Videodrome or Scanners, and it gives in to the gore much more whole-heartedly. It remains, in fact, the most 'standart' horror film of Cronenberg's career.
And yet The Fly is still a success on a very different level; character development takes the place of world-building, and so it manages to achieve more emotional connection than any other Cronenberg film made before A History of Violence. Jeff Goldblum delivers a shockingly good performance - maybe the best of his career, and creates one of the most sympathetic, pathetic horror-film monsters in history. The fact that we see him grow into the monster gradually over the course of the film makes it even more gut-wrenching. The Fly is not a Cronenberg classic, but it's definitely a horror classic.