‘The Shrouds’ Review – David Cronenberg’s Devastating Look At Grief And Loss [NYFF 2024]

Loss and grief find us all in different ways. For some, they lead us to learn a new way of life and independence without a loved one. For others, they send us into a spiral of self-retreat, shutting everyone else out of their lives. And still, for some other folks, it leads to something more mysterious. David Cronenberg’s most recent film, The Shrouds, takes us down the rabbit hole of a man experiencing this third route, following Vincent Cassel’s Karsh as a tech and business mogul who has created an innovative way to keep track of lost loved ones in their grave. This invention is spurred on by the death of his wife, Becca (Diane Kruger), as he wants to stay connected to what is happening with her body as it decomposes in her final resting place. After anonymous deviants ransack Karsh’s model GraveTech cemetery, he and his tech-savvy ex-brother-in-law Maury (Guy Pearce) begin to pull the long thread seeking to explain why these graves were desecrated.

Cronenberg is a cinema staple known for his interests in horror, the body, and how our bodies are interconnected with technology. The Shrouds is another masterful addition to the genre he helped make popular over his decades-long career and might be his most personal to date. He was inspired to write this film after his wife Carolyn lost her life to cancer and channeled a lot of the grief he experienced into this script. 

Despite its grave and personal subject matter, The Shrouds has an air of humor and whimsy that works surprisingly well. The performances from Cassel, Kruger (playing three roles!), and Guy Pearce come off awkward at first but as the film settles in you realize this is completely intentional. Cassel especially delivers every line with a matter-of-fact inflection that is laughable considering some of the things he’s saying. Karsh is simultaneously completely engrossed in discovering the intricacies of his wife’s decaying body and desensitized to the horrifying images he repeatedly shows strangers and friends alike. 

Cassel’s Cronenberg cosplay and Pearce’s conspiratorial mania are fun to watch, but Kruger absolutely steals the show here. She also has the most to do, playing Karsh’s wife Becca in flashbacks, Becca’s twin sister Terry, and being the model and voice behind Karsh’s AI personal assistant Hunny. This is by far her best work since Inglorious Basterds, offering Becca’s deep affection for Karsh and Terry’s distant fascination with the man her sister loved so dearly. 

Cronenberg’s story here plays Karsh and Maury as perfect opposites as they experience their grief, the former from the loss of his wife through death and the latter from the same through a bitter divorce. Their loss is similar in nature, yet their response couldn’t be more different. Karsh is driven by this loss to create a technological advancement that, while controversial, he believes is in the ultimate good of all. Maury, on the other hand, locks himself primarily in a small, untidy apartment that he uses to scheme his way back into Terry’s life. Ultimately, the grave vandalism incident leads them both down the same path, incessantly exploring conspiracies and theories to find a way to explain not only what happened at the cemetery, but in their marriages.

The Shrouds is a striking, compelling take on what happens when different people experience a tormenting kind of grief that eats away at them day by day. The lies we tell ourselves, the unanswerable questions that lead us to think terrible things about our loved ones. Cronenberg packages his own story into this one beautifully and reminds us to not take any time we get with those we care for the most for granted. The plot itself admittedly gets a little out of hand in the latter half hour, but its twists and turns mirror the healing process in that it’s not always linear. Constant ups and downs come with no warning and no respect for the progress we’ve made regarding loss. 

Director of Programming at Lincoln Center Dennis Lim said it best in regard to this film: “David Cronenberg’s recent work is as vital today as it was when he started 50 years ago.” I can’t recommend his work enough and The Shrouds is his most personal film in recent memory, giving it an urgency and personality unique in his filmography.

The Shrouds held its U.S. Premiere as part of the Main Slate section at the 2024 New York Film Festival. The film is targeting a spring 2025 theatrical release from Sideshow and Janus Films. 

Director: David Cronenberg

Writer: David Cronenberg

Rated: NR

Runtime: 119m