A History of Violence (2005)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2005
	Director: David Cronenberg (Scanners, Naked Lunch, The Fly, Videodrome, Eastern Promises)
	Actors: Viggo Mortensen (The Lord of the Rings 1-3, Eastern Promises), Maria Bello (Payback, E.R TV series), William Hurt (Dark City, The Incredible Hulk), Ed Harris (Apollo 13, Ed TV)
	Country: USA, D
	Genre: Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 15.12.2012, DVD, Home cinema
Synopsis: A regular man (Mortensen) in a small town will become an American hero and attract unwanted attention to him and his family.
Review: It was a positive shock when I saw this movie for the first time. I thought Cronenberg dead and buried, his success was winding down with Crash, eXistenZ, Spider, but he managed to get out of his traditionnal genre of hard/gore/strange organic movies to produce somehing completely different and surprise everybody. One must watch the international and not american version of History of Violence, in which a few typical Cronenberg organic scenes have not been edited out, and reinforce the message of the film. I find this movie very well filmed, the actors (in particular Mortensen) very convincing, and the music by Howard Shore (The Fly, The Lord of the Rings) just what is needed: guiding your feelings but never stealing the attention over the images. I love the wordless ending, all played in the characters eyes and subtle reactions, and you understand that things are going to be allright. I have read the Grapic Novel that inspired the movie and I find the adaptation very well done also. The third act of the novel (in which Joeys brother is alive and has been tortured for twenty years) would not have worked on film. I also liked Cronenberg's next film Eastern Promises, although not so much, and am looking forward to Cosmopolis. The only reason I didn't give it the highest ranking is because I find that the introduction of the perfect family at the beginning of the movie is a bit too cheesy.
Rating: 9 /10