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Movies / On DVD / Dead Ringers
Dead Ringers

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Dead Ringers (1988)

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83 %
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Reviews Counted: 35

Fresh: 29

Rotten:6

Average Rating: 7.7/10

Runtime: 1 hr 57 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: This dark, eerie, multi-layered drama may stand as Cronenberg's masterpiece. The film is loosely based on the true case of the Marcus Twins and the novel about them, TWINS by Bari Wood. The Mantle brothers, Beverly and Elliot, are... This dark, eerie, multi-layered drama may stand as Cronenberg's masterpiece. The film is loosely based on the true case of the Marcus Twins and the novel about them, TWINS by Bari Wood. The Mantle brothers, Beverly and Elliot, are brilliant gynecologists with an upscale Toronto practice. Elliot is charismatic and outgoing, Beverly is shy and hard-working; emotionally inseparable, the brothers function like psychological Siamese twins. They share everything, including women, until Beverly--the weaker of the two--falls in love with a neurotic, drug addicted, actress. Forced to separate from his brother for the first time, Beverly becomes hooked on drugs and suffers a complete mental breakdown. Elliot, unable to exist independently of his twin, soon joins Beverly in a nightmarish descent into madness and self-destruction. Irons plays the brothers (achieved with seamless camera trickery), whose award winning research in gynecology has brought them international acclaim. Wholly original and uniquely disturbing, it could have been made by an alien, providing he had David Cronenberg's healthy disregard for commercial cinema and a unique sense of the human condition. [More]

Starring: Jeremy Irons, Geneviève Bujold, Heidi Von Palleske, Barbara Gordon

Starring: Jeremy Irons, Geneviève Bujold, Heidi Von Palleske, Barbara Gordon, David Hughes

Director: David Cronenberg

Director: David Cronenberg
Screenwriter: David Cronenberg, Norman Snider
Producer: David Cronenberg, Marc Boyman
Composer: Howard Shore
Producer: Carol Baum, Sylvio Tabet

[See More Credits]

DVD Info

 
 
 
 
Release:

Jan 27, 1998

[DVD Details]
 
 

DVD Features:

  • Region 1 Encoding
  • Special Features: Theatrical Trailer.
  • Keep Case

Reviews for Dead Ringers

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1 - 20 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
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Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment Comment
10/18/08
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid
Ratings Image

Irons gives a highly accomplished performance in a chilly knife-swapping psychodrama that remains among the director's leanest, meanest releases.

Full Review Source: Channel 4 Film | comment Comment
10/08/08
Channel 4 Film
Ratings Image

Director David Cronenberg handles his usual fondness for gore in muted style.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
09/24/07
Variety Staff
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
Ratings Image

People like myself who find the character played by [Genevieve] Bujold (in one of her best performances) more interesting than either of the twins are bound to feel rather frustrated by the end.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment 1 Comment
09/24/07
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Chicago Reader
Ratings Image

Impeccably executed, Cronenberg's first masterpiece is an unsettling film in which biological horror is entirely conveyed through pyschological exploration of character, masterfully played by Jeremy Irons in the best performance of his career.

Full Review Source: EmanuelLevy.Com | comment Comment
04/30/07
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com
Ratings Image

It's one of Cronenberg's more complex relationship tales, that puts a deadly spin on separation, loss and hopeless love.

Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews | comment Comment
03/02/07
Dennis Schwartz
Ozus' World Movie Reviews
Ratings Image

Cronenberg and Irons achieve perfection in horror.

comment Comment
03/13/06
Cole Smithey
ColeSmithey.com
Ratings Image

An intense psychological drama which confronts [Cronenberg's] familiar preoccupations -- fear of physical and mental disintegration, mortality, the power struggle between the sexes -- without the paradoxical protection of visceral disgust.

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
01/26/06
Nigel Floyd
Time Out
Ratings Image

No review available.

comment Comment
07/16/05
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com
Ratings Image

Irons is startlingly off-kilter, his performance a veritable textbook example of deranged if icy brilliance

Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | comment Comment
06/02/05
Keith Breese
Filmcritic.com
Ratings Image

Dead Ringers is not a fun or particularly upbeat film, but it does grab you by the collar and it sucks you right into the screen.

Full Review Source: DVDTalk.com | comment Comment
05/30/05
Scott Weinberg
DVDTalk.com
Ratings Image

No review available.

comment Comment
03/30/05
Andy Klein
Los Angeles CityBeat
Ratings Image

No review available.

comment Comment
02/07/05
Philip Martin
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Ratings Image

One of Cronenberg's creepiest. And Irons is freaking amazing.

comment Comment
01/25/05
Widgett Walls
Needcoffee.com
Ratings Image

No review available.

comment Comment
01/18/05
Frank Swietek
One Guy's Opinion
Ratings Image

Trite, weird, ridiculous, uneventful, sick. Cronenberg at his worst.

comment Comment
09/30/03
Moira Sullivan
FilmFestivals.com
Ratings Image

Cronenberg's most perverse and disconcerting film.

comment Comment
08/27/03
Ken Hanke
Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
Ratings Image

Extremely unsettling, at times amusing, cold yet personal, Dead Ringers gradually and deliberately comes to horrify the viewer, rather than shocking outright with such spectacular displays of gore.

Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | comment Comment
07/30/03
TV Guide's Movie Guide
Ratings Image

A terrifying performance courtesy of Jeremy Irons

comment Comment
06/19/03
Jon Niccum
Lawrence Journal-World
Ratings Image

Cronenberg, who has begun to emerge as a master of body-related horrific fantasy, clearly understands that a small amount of medical mischief can be more unnerving than conventional grisliness.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
05/20/03
Janet Maslin
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
1 - 20 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
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Latest News for Dead Ringers

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