Scanners

Dir: David Cronenberg

1981

****

David Cronenberg once called Scanners the most frustrating film he'd ever made. The film was rushed through production - filming had to begin without a finished script and to end within two months so that the financing would qualify as a tax write-off, forcing Cronenberg to write and shoot at the same time. I can’t help but think Cronenberg borrowed heavily from William S. Burroughs' 1959 novel 'Naked Lunch' which contains a chapter concerning "Senders" - a hostile organization of telepaths bent on world domination. A clear literary inspiration for this film. Cronenberg would of course later direct a film version of Naked Lunch just over a decade later. Cronenberg also cited difficulty with and antagonism between the leads, particularly Patrick McGoohan and Jennifer O'Neill. I would argue that Scanner is more ‘dark sci-fi’ than it is horror but the famous scene of a man’s head exploding is horror at its finest. Private security firm ConSec plans to showcase a powerful new potential weapon. Known as scanners, they are psychics with powers including telepathy/mind-control, empathy, biopathy, cyberpathy/technopathy, and psychokinesis/telekinesis. However, when ConSec's scanner demonstrates his powers, the volunteer - Revok (Michael Ironside – in one of the best performances of his career) - turns out to be a more powerful scanner, who causes the ConSec scanner's head to explode, via hydrostatic shock from biopathically-increased blood pressure. When ConSec officials attempt to take Revok into custody, he kills them and escapes. Stung by this embarrassing experience, ConSec security head Braedon Keller (Lawrence Dane),  advocates shutting down ConSec's scanner research program. Program head Dr. Paul Ruth (Patrick McGoohan) disagrees, saying the assassination and escape demonstrate scanning's potential. Ruth attributes the operation to Revok, who (according to Ruth) has his own underground network of scanners competing with ConSec's program. Ruth argues that ConSec should recruit scanners to their cause to infiltrate and bring down Revok's group. Dr. Ruth brings in scanner Cameron Vale (Stephen Lack), a homeless social outcast driven mad by his undisciplined power, and injects him with ephemerol, which temporarily inhibits his scanning ability and restores his sanity. When Vale's mind is clear, Ruth asks for his help, explaining that Vale is a scanner and Revok is killing all scanners who refuse to join him. Under Ruth's guidance, Vale learns to control his scanning abilities. Unknown to Dr. Ruth, ConSec's security head, Keller works for Revok as a spy. Revok learns of Ruth's infiltration plan, and dispatches assassins to follow Vale as he visits an unaffiliated scanner named Benjamin Pierce, who may know Revok's whereabouts. Revok's assassins brutally shoot Pierce to death. Enraged, Vale uses his telepathic power to kill some of the assassins. As Pierce dies, Vale reads from his mind a name - Kim Obrist (Jennifer O'Neill). Vale tracks down Obrist, who has formed a telepathic alliance with a group of other scanners in opposition to Revok's group. Vale attends a meeting, but Revok's assassins strike again; only Vale and Obrist survive. Scanning an assassin, Vale learns of a drug company, which he then infiltrates. He finds large quantities of ephemerol are being distributed under a computer program called "Ripe", run by Revok himself through ConSec. Vale and Obrist return to ConSec, where Ruth suggests Vale cyberpathically-scan the computer system to learn more about the Ripe program. Meanwhile, Keller attacks Obrist and kills Dr. Ruth while Vale and Obrist flee the ConSec building. Vale cyberpathically accesses the computer network through a telephone booth and pulls ephemerol shipment information. When Keller discovers this, he orders the computer system shut down while Vale is scanning it; Keller hopes to harm or kill Vale by doing so. The plan backfires and the computer explodes, killing Keller and leaving Vale and Obrist unharmed. They visit a doctor on the list of ephemerol recipients, where Obrist discovers a pregnant woman's fetus has scanned her. Vale realizes ephemerol also causes fetuses to become scanners when administered to pregnant women. Obrist and Vale are ambushed by Revok and his men and abducted. Revok reveals to Vale ephemerol was originally developed by Dr. Ruth as a tranquilizer for pregnant women: Ruth learned about the drug's side-effect by providing it to his wife during her pregnancies; Revok reveals that he and Vale are actually brothers and Dr. Ruth was their father. Because their mother received the highest dose of ephemerol, Revok and Vale are the most powerful scanners. By mass-distributing ephemerol to unwitting doctors, who prescribe it to their pregnant patients, Revok plans to create a new generation of scanners to take over the world, which he will control. Revok asks Vale to join him, but Vale refuses. The two have a final telepathic battle against one another, Revok declaring that he'll 'suck you dry' if Vale won't side with him. Instead, while Vale's body is incinerated, his mind takes over Revok's body to save himself. Obrist enters the room to find Vale's charred body on the floor. She hears Vale's voice coming from the corner of the room. In the corner is Revok, with his head scar gone and his eyes replaced with Vale's eyes. He faces Obrist and announces in Vale's voice, "We've won." The ending is very clever, while the story incorporates Naked Lunch and the well known real life thalidomide scandal of the 1950s, the ending is ominous as to whether the conclusion is a good thing or the beginning of something far worse than what Revok imagined. It’s a great sci-fi thriller with a clever idea and some great performances but it is ‘that’ scene that really makes the film. Special effects artist Dick Smith (The Exorcist) produced the effect for the exploding head scene by filling a latex head of the actor with dog food, leftover lunch, fake blood and rabbit livers, and shooting it from behind with a 12-gauge shotgun. It is the scene everyone remembers and one of the all time greats within the horror genre – even though Scanners isn’t quite a horror. I think that is the only criticism I have with it. While I like a good thriller, the film soon became about the special effects and the anticipation of another head-bursting attack, although I am glad this wasn’t overdone. I do love the way it was filmed though, it’s one of those grainy early 80s shockers that I’d seen for years on the top shelf of my video shop as a child and it didn’t disappoint when I was finally old enough to rent it. Not Cronenberg’s best, but it certainly got me into the directors work.