The Shrouds (15)
Directed by David Cronenberg
★★★★

THIS may be director David Cronenberg’s most personal film to date as he explores grief and its crippling effects in this bold and provocative yet macabre thriller. 

It was inspired by the death of his second wife of almost 40 years and how it affected the 82-year-old filmmaker. 

Written and directed by Cronenberg, it follows Karsh (Vincent Cassel), a tech entrepreneur who has been inconsolable since the death of his spouse Becca (Diane Kruger). He invents GraveTech, a revolutionary and controversial technology that allows people virtually to be in the grave with their loved ones via a shroudcam that gives them a 360 degree and 3D view of them. Bizarrely he has a restaurant located beside his high-tech cemetery. 

As well as studying grief, Cronenberg also examines the meaning people attempt to give to death, to make sense of it, be it spiritual and religious or through technology and conspiracy theories. Becca’s twin sister Terry (also played by Kruger), for example, believes that they were killing Becca in the hospital.  

Karsh becomes disturbed by GraveTech, and then the sudden destruction of several graves including Becca’s. He suspects the Russians or the Chinese may be to blame for hacking his system, and is egged on by his paranoid and schizophrenic former brother-in-law Maury (Guy Pierce) who is still stalking his own ex-wife, Terry.  

These things stop Karsh dealing with his grief, along with the guilt of trying to move on. Karsh keeps having disturbing dreams of Becca coming to him naked, her mutilated body ravaged by cancer. They intensify as he becomes involved with the blind wife (Sandrine Holt) of a rich businessman and a potential investor. Meanwhile, his sexual encounters with Terry add an even creepier note, as she is the spitting image of Becca.

Cassel, who looks like Cronenberg, gives a quietly powerful performance as a man who cannot overcome his wife’s death, missing her desperately. Even his virtual assistant Hunny (Kruger) sounds like her. And Kruger shows her extensive acting prowess in three very different roles. 

Ending on an ambiguous and frustrating note Cronenberg leaves it up to you to decide its meaning as he delivers an intriguing and unique yet gruesome exploration of loss and death. Being Cronenberg, this isn’t for the squeamish. 

In cinemas July 4