Videodrome

I thought this was a good movie. It didn't seem confusing to me; it seemed as though the premise was, in a mixed metaphor kind of way, you are what you eat. Or in this case, you are what you watch. The gun was outside of him, the gun was inside of him, the gun became him (or rather, he grew the gun). Videodrome (or violence) was outside of him, and then literally it was inside of him as they inserted the VHS cassettes into his gut.
I have to believe that we watch that stuff and play the violent video games and slow down when passing a car accident on US 19 because A) we're glad it's not us, and B) we can more easily deal with the normal crappy stuff that life hands us because IT ISN'T THAT BAD.
Does this make Max and what he does for a living any more palatable? No. He's still an opportunistic scumbag who has a change of heart after, and only after, he sees first hand what the violence does to people. If videodrome had never made his own personal life hell, he would have kept on producing those shows and watching pirated videos.
Speaking of pirating...I thought Harlan (pictured above) was one of the creepiest parts of the movie. The guy you think is your friend for two years...turns out to be against you from the beginning-sacrifices you like the scientist sacrifices the rat he's been feeding.
The lines I liked: "I am videodrome made flesh." Didn't Jesus say he was the word made flesh? So, we can become good or evil just by turning towards good or evil? Hmmm.
And this scene, where Harlan says: "North America's getting soft, patron, and the rest of the world is getting tough. Very, very tough. We're entering savage new times, and we're giong to have to be pure and direct and strong, if we're going to survive them. Now, you and this cesspool you call a television station and your people who wallow around in it, your viewers who watch you do it, they're rotting us away from the inside." How many of us have not thought that the US is lagging behind and that tv, entertainment in general, and the laziness those breed are part of the problem?