David Cronenberg Says Next Film Might Be ‘Consumed’

In a recent interview for the LA Times, David Cronenberg made some waves by mentioning the possibility that “The Shrouds,” now in theaters, might be the final film of his career.

"The world doesn't need my next film," he said, after clarifying that another project would be a certain “arrogance.”

Now, in an interview with Variety, Cronenberg is taking it all back. He might have been trolling us. He’s confirming in the middle of writing the script for an adaptation of his own novel, “Consumed.”

I’m talking to Robert Lantos, who’s a Canadian producer who produced “Crimes of the Future” and worked with me on some other films, so we know each other very well. We’re talking about possibly doing a movie based on my novel “Consumed.” I’ve written one novel, and he’s wanted to turn that either into a series or a movie for some years, and he’s kind of convinced me that it would be good if I gave it a shot. So I’m working on a script for my own book, which is quite interesting. I’ve never done that before. I’ve only written one book, so it’s a new experience. The question is whether the script will turn out to be something that we want to do. Will it be a script that could be financed? It wouldn’t be cheap, it takes place in four countries, so of course we can’t tell right now. But that’s where it might go.

“Consumed” is a thriller that weaves a tale of sex, cannibalism, disease, geopolitics and 3D printing. The story centers on a romantic and professional couple of journalists. The husband ends up contracting a mysterious sexually transmitted disease known as Roiphe’s disease. He discovers that the doctor who is the namesake of the disease lives in Toronto, so he travels there looking for treatment.

Cronenberg almost quit making films after 2014’s “Maps to the Stars” only to come back eight years later with “Crimes of the Future.”At the 2022 San Sebastián Film Festival, Cronenberg admitted that he almost quit making films and he was very serious about it. “I thought I was finished, but I hope to commit more crimes in the future, by making more films.”

Cronenberg, a maverick who has always flown by his own artistic free will, for five decades now, is known for such classics as “Videodrome,” “The Fly,” “Dead Ringers,” and “A History of Violence.”