The attack of the Canadian rape zombies. This early work from David Cronenberg offers up most of the obsessions that he’d deal with in his next several films. It’s got the creepy doctors, the medical experiments gone wrong and the gory biological disasters all in a fiercely contemporary (circa the mid-1970s) setting. The threat here is a parasitic worm, developed by a doctor, that jumps into people and turns them into violent sex maniacs. It runs like Jerry the Mouse all over a swingin’ 70s upscale apartment building, but it does most of its work through sexual transmission. Consider this to be about venereal disease in a time and place of free and easy love, if you want. Or maybe this is a portrait of the struggle between basic human instincts and civilized living. The funny thing about it all is how much Cronenberg enjoys the resulting chaos. The apartment high-rise here (where the entire film takes place) is weirdly sterile and too perfect. There’s something about it that we don’t trust. Even the tour guide creeps us out. It’s sold as heaven, but feels like hell. The ideal place for a nasty little sex worm to thrive.