Brian O'Blivion:
The battle for the mind of North America will be fought in the video arena: the Videodrome. The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye. Therefore, the television screen is part of the physical structure of the brain. Therefore, whatever appears on the television screen emerges as raw experience for those who watch it. Therefore, television is reality, and reality is less than television.
Barry Convex:
You'll forgive me if I don't stay around to watch. I just can't cope with the freaky stuff.
Max Renn:
I'm looking for something that'll... break through. You know?
Brian O'Blivion:
The television screen is the retina of the mind's eye.
Max Renn:
I want you to stay away from them. Those mondo-weirdo video guys. You know, in some countries, like Argentina, making subversive video is considered a criminal act. They execute people for it. In Pittsburgh... WHO KNOWS?
Max Renn:
[
just before Harlan explodes] See you in Pittsburgh.
Max Renn:
Death to Videodrome! Long live The New flesh!
[
last lines]
Max Renn:
Long live the new flesh.
Nicki Brand:
I live in a highly excited state of overstimulation.
Rena King:
What about it, Nicki? Is it socially positive?
Nicki Brand:
Well, I think we live in overstimulated times. We crave stimulation for its own sake. We gorge ourselves on it. We always want more, whether it's tactile, emotional or sexual. And I think that's bad.
Max Renn:
Then why did you wear that dress?
Nicki Brand:
Sorry?
Max Renn:
That dress. It's very stimulating.
[
looks at Rena]
Max Renn:
And it's red. You know what Freud would've said about that dress.
Nicki Brand:
And he would've been right. I admit it. I live in a highly excited state of overstimulation.
Max Renn:
Listen, I'd really like to take you out to dinner tonight
Brian O'Blivion:
Television is reality, and reality is less than television.
Brian O'Blivion:
I believe that the growth in my head-this head-this one right here. I think that it is not really a tumor... not an uncontrolled, undirected little bubbling pot of flesh... but that it is in fact a new organ... a new part of the brain.
Barry Convex:
I think that you'll find a little SandM will be necessary to trigger off a good healthy dose of hallucinations.
Max Renn:
Do you know a show called 'Videodrome'?
Masha:
Video what?
Max Renn:
Videodrome. Like video circus, video arena. Do you know it?
Masha:
No.
Max Renn:
It's just torture and murder. No plot, no characters. Very, very realistic. I think it's what's next.
Masha:
Then God help us.
[
about violence]
Max Renn:
Better on T.V. than on the streets.
Brian O'Blivion:
After a while, I started hallucinating, and developed a tumor. I believe the visions caused the tumor, and not the other way around.
Nicki Brand:
Got any porno?
Max Renn:
You serious?
Nicki Brand:
Yeah. It gets me in the mood.
[
looks through casettes]
Nicki Brand:
What's this? "Videodrome"?
Max Renn:
Torture. Murder.
Nicki Brand:
Sounds great.
Max Renn:
Ain't exactly sex.
Nicki Brand:
Says who?
Max Renn:
Have you been hallucinating lately?
Harlan:
No. Should I be?
Max Renn:
Yes, you should be.
Brian O'Blivion:
After all, there is nothing real outside our perception of reality, is there?
Max Renn:
I am the Video Word made Flesh.
Masha:
[
to Max] Videodrome is something for you to leave alone.
Masha:
Videodrome. What you see on that show, it's for real. It's not acting. It's snuff TV.
Max Renn:
I don't believe it.
Masha:
So, don't believe.
Max Renn:
Why do it for real? It's easier and safer to fake it.
Masha:
Because it has something that you don't have, Max. It has a philosophy. And that is what makes it dangerous.
Harlan:
I don't work with you for the money.
Max Renn:
I know that. 'Cause piracy's never just for the money, is it?
Harlan:
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. We intend to stop that rot.
Max Renn:
D'you want a cup of coffee?
Max Renn:
Careful... it bites.
[
First line]
Man's voice on television:
Civic TV. The one you take to bed with you.
Max Renn:
Tell me about my 'Videodrome' problem.
Bianca O'Blivion:
My father knows much more about it than I do.
[
Biana hands Max a pile of videotapes]
Bianca O'Blivion:
Listen to him.
Max Renn:
[
on hearing that Brian may send a tape, rather than meet] If he does, that's going to make conversation a little difficult.
Bianca O'Blivion:
My father has not engaged in conversation for at least twenty years. The monologue is his preferred mode of discourse.
Brian O'Blivion:
[
to Max Renn] Your reality is already HALF video hallucination. If you're not careful, it will become TOTAL hallucination. You'll have to learn to live in a very strange new world.
Brian O'Blivion:
Max, I'm so glad you came.
Related Links
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