A History of Violence (2005): a draft essay

Cronenberg ventures into a Lynchian realm of the uncanny in A History of Violence, a stylish pseudo-thriller in disguise. What begins as a genre film that engages the voyeur turns against the audience and results in an intellectual complicity; when the good guys justifiably obliterate the bad men, the discerning viewer wonders if the defeated were merely replaced by something deadlier. In this dark film, trouble gravitates towards a peaceful family man & his small community when mobsters seek his attention after a publicized heroic act. Beneath the suspense & exhilaration of self-defense lurks the inelegant outcome of self-preservation. The "aw shucks" small town setting evokes Blue Velvet’s Lumberton; the evil man sports a grotesque facial disfigurement instead of a breathing mask that feeds a sewer of obscenity. However, after the thrill of the main action, the film does not conclude with the verdant landscape of sunshine on white picket fences, but a protagonist who returns an outsider from what Stephen Price would call “the wilderness” (Prince 260).

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