David Cronenberg returns to Cannes with The Shroudsa cathartic thriller about grief led by Vincent Cassel and Diane Kruger for which the poster has dropped.
While Megalopolis was revealed in a trailer and only first images of The Substance, the body horror film by Coralie Fargeat, have been published, the Cannes competition is starting to become more and more exciting. Especially since the official competition will mix new faces (Payal Kapadia, Agathe Riedinger, Magnus Von Horn or Coralie Fargeat) and industry giants (Yorgos Lanthimos, Paolo Sorrentino, Jacques Audiard, Michel Hazanavicius…).
Among his regulars on the Croisette, we will also come across David Cronenberg. The Canadian is already making his return to competition with his bereaved thriller, The Shroudsonly two years later Crimes of the Future. If first images of The Shrouds (titled The Shrouds in original version) had already been revealed, new photos were published a few days before its Cannes presentation as well asa first poster which already says a lot about the atmosphere.
The dead of the future
It is therefore an all blue poster that Pyramide Distribution has revealed for The Shrouds by David Cronenberg. A choice of color which does not seem insignificant given the subject of the film. Indeed, the feature film will be a way for the Canadian to exorcise the death of his wife Carolyn, died in 2019 after a long illness. He will follow like this “Karsh, 50 years old, renowned businessman. Inconsolable since the death of his wife, he invents a revolutionary and controversial system, GraveTech, which allows the living to connect to their deceased loved ones in their shrouds. One night, several graves , including that of his wife, are vandalized. Karsh sets out to find the culprits.
While the color red invaded the poster of Crimes of the Future, presaging the violence and passionate sexuality at the heart of the film, the color blue here, on the contrary, gives off a feeling of calm. With this possibility of connecting to the shrouds of their loved ones, the characters should switch to a new state, touching the beyond, creating a possible link between inert bodies and their still living spirits. Even if an investigation will, a priori, be at the heart of the story, THE Shrouds should therefore abandon the gore and bloody images usual for Cronenberg for a more moving storypoetic and personal.
Fear of the afterlife?
It is also in a logical continuity for the filmmaker, he who had explored his art through Crimes of the Future will thus probe his intimacy and his romantic relationship on the big screen with The Shrouds. In the shoes of his alter-ego Karsh, we will therefore find Vincent Cassel (his third collaboration with Cronenberg), accompanied by Diane Kruger, Sandrine Holt and Guy Pearce. You will have to wait in France until September 25, 2024 to discover the film in the cinema, but the first notices will fall very soon.
