Nightmare Fuel 2018: Day 61 – Rabid

Looks like our little excursion has been extended beyond Finland, as we’re heading to the Great White North for some classic David Cronenberg. We’re going back before the days of Scanners and Videodrome to Cronenberg’s salad days with 1977’s Rabid.

Our story begins in quaint Quebec, where Rose and her boyfriend, Hart, are out on their motorcycle. Trying to swerve to avoid a van in the road, they wind up beefing it: Hart is able to walk away with only relatively minor injuries (I’ve never broken a hand nor separated a shoulder, but it could have been worse), but Rose is pinned beneath the bike, which winds up exploding, causing some major damage and burns. With no full hospital in the immediate vicinity, the two are sent to a nearby plastic surgery clinic, which just so happens to specialize in a radical treatment involving morphogenetically neutral skin grafts. Such a procedure is performed on Rose, but this strangely results in her developing a condition that forces her body to only be able to survive by feeding on human blood. Essentially, the procedure made her into a damn vampire, complete with a growth in her armpit that helps her feed. Now, you’d think this would be bad enough, but once she’s done feasting on a person, that person becomes an infected rabid zombie, for lack of a better descriptor. You can imagine the chaos that would result if she were to make her way to, say, Montreal, right?

This film is one of those occasions where a relatively limited budget works in its favor. Cronenberg wasn’t quite established as a filmmaker yet, so his resources remained low for this outing. The no-frills feel contributes to the creepy atmosphere Cronenberg’s so good at forging, and everything just oozes grit and partial realism, even in spite of the slightly outlandish setup. Think early Romero stuff.

Funny story, Sissy Spacek was the original choice to play Rose, but she was voted down by the studio and producers, who felt that Spacek’s fairly thick Texan accent would be distracting. Fair play, she went on to star in Carrie that year, which became a massive hit. Meanwhile, the producers, particularly Ivan Reitman (who you’ll probably know better as the producer behind Ghostbusters), wanted some guaranteed crossover sex appeal for the role, so they opted for Marilyn Chambers, mostly known at that time for her more adult-oriented performances. Fair play once again, Chambers did pretty well with the role, impressing Cronenberg throughout filming. The rest of the cast is serviceable, but nothing special’s gonna be found here.

Indeed, that’s ultimately how I feel about Rabid as a whole. It’s a solid idea executed with as much skill and panache as needed to get things done, but nothing really stands out about it. It’s nothing bad, nor is it anything noteworthy. It’s fine. I’d recommend it if you’re looking for an interesting hybrid between vampire and zombie fare, or if you wanna see the foundations for Cronenberg’s future craziness.