The Fly (1986) 30 years later...

Rating: 10/10 (18 September 2015)

Recently I decided to watch 'The Fly' again since a long time and I experienced it from e fresh point of view.
It is the only horror remake ever to be way better than the original version. I do know that 'The Thing' by John Carpenter is a great one too, but that one is not based on the original movie, but another interpretation of the same book on which the earlier movie was also based.
'The Fly' still is an artistic masterpiece. Many of the effects have survived the test of time and of course every review on the internet describes this remake as way better than the earlier movie.
When it came out in 1986, many viewers considered it as a cultural metaphor for AIDS, while David Cronenberg never thought of it that way. Cronenberg's view was that it is a metaphor for illness in general and also the process of aging, like midlife crisis.
Watching it today and being a nurse in psychiatric fields, makes me interpretate it as a metaphor also for psychiatric conditions, like bipolar disorders or something likewise.
Over here in Holland, Dutch actor Anthonie Kamerling was bipolar and he committed suicide. Having been depressed for a long period of time, he was energetic to the max, day and night, just before he killed himself.
Manical people don't consider themselves as ill. They're feeling great, life is one big party time. Their families and environment do know something's wrong with them by intuition, but they can't put a finger on it. Anthonie's wife Isa Hoes, also a Dutch actress, wrote a book about him and she described how Anthony was way more powerful with words than she is.
'The Fly' tells us a story with same elements within the process of Seth Brundle. After his teleportation, he starts to change in behavior and this proceeds until he starts to see something is wrong with him. By then, it already is too late for him and his breakdown and degeneration as a human being has already become unstoppable. That of course is put in the story for dramatic purposes and it shouldn't be taken as a truthful standard process in illness in general. In reality, much can be done to treat the diseases that I've mentioned and to stabilize them or control them, even though bipolar disorder is not without risk.
'The Fly' is a great horror movie that survives the test of time and will never know another remake better then this one...