Who do you like better? David Cronenberg or John Waters?

So I rented “Crash” (NOT the Paul Haggis Crash) because I recently watched “eXistenZ” which is also directed by David Cronenberg, and loved it, and “A History of Violence” is seriously one of my all time favorite movies.
Crash is about people who are turned on my car crashes. It won the 1996 Porn award for best alternative feature so that should tell you something. Pretty much everyone has sex with everyone (a world without STDs!) and there is little to no plot. What plot there is goes something like this: James Spader gets in a car wreck and kills Holly Hunter’s husband. Later, they have sex in a car park. Then they watch a recreation of James Dean’s crash. They meet Vaughn, a guy obsessed with car wrecks. Vaughn may be a homicidal maniac but James Spader lets him fuck his wife in the backseat of his car while the three of them go through a carwash.
The movie tries to explore the connection between death and eroticism which is in itself interesting. But the lack of a plot means the movie is basically sex scene, car crash, awkward conversation, sex scene, sex scene, car crash, etc. “Crash” was a book first and I feel like it probably worked better. As it is, it really works best as porn. And porn is boring.
The idea that we feel most alive when we are closest to death is interesting (they don’t call it le petit mort for nothing) but is probably not a theme that works in film. The movie’s titillation with disfiguration give the movie a cinematic spark. But over all my vote is: meh.
Which brings me to John Waters. John Waters’ movies also explore eroticism and his characters are bizarre and grotesque. But there is such a humor to his movies that you can’t help but love them even when they’re dealing with serious(ish) topics. I recently watched Cecil B. Demented which is John Waters’ fuck-you-hollywood-i-don’t-wanna-sell-out movie. Again, everyone has sex with everyone, but at the end Melanie Griffith lights her hair on fire. And who doesn’t love that?