Notebook Extract

The Fly

For most of Cronenberg's male protagonists, sexual contact results in disease and / or mutation. Personal identity and notions of the self disintegrate as Cronenberg represents the infected male as a womb in which the abstracted life form gestates. Often unable to cope with this transformation the male relies upon the strong female of the narrative in order to rectify the status quo. After his disastrous teleportation, Seth Brundle slowly transforms into a hybrid of human and fly, resulting in a breakdown of the human form into Brundlefly. Unable to deal with the consequences of his actions, Brundle retreats into science, cataloging his decay and keeping his rejected body parts in specimen jars. Accepting his mutation with a rational mind, Brundle's clinical approach emphases his self-alienation. As such Brundle becomes another Cronenberg male: obsessional, incapable of dealing with emotions and alienated from those who surround him.