Total Cronenbore! I have admired Cronenberg's work since VIDEODROME. Always stamping his creativity in ways subtle, and less so, he is willing to walk in dark and unexplored territory and usually justifies his self-imposed trek there. I'd have to say CRASH alone was his one error of judgement although I suspect he himself was delighted with it. That SPIDER is a tour-de-force of acting, direction and production design, is beyond question. Fiennes inhabits the psychotically schizophrenic Spider's body in distressingly realistic detail, his every nuance painful to watch. When it all comes down to it though, at the heart of this tale is Cronenberg's obssessive focus on sex. It is what set the young Spider on his demented journey to the institution. Not actually DOING it, or even SEEING it this time...simply the fact that coming across his mom in her slip made him aroused to the point he had to blame someone for his new-found inner turmoil. Where the film falls down is in the fact that Spider's virtually incoherent mumblings are just plain irritating - Cronenberg may have been better served shooting the film in total silence! In as much as we have to piece together reality basically from a schizophrenic's flash-backs there is at no stage a platform of solid definition to build on. The young Spider looks as demented as his older counterpart. Ultimately its simply a case of "who the hell cares anyway?" Miranda Richardson in her multiple roles is awesome and we're talking staggering brilliance here! One of the best films I ever saw for so little purpose. The greatest scenes in the film are the opening credits and Fiennes disembarking from the train - it was a "10" at that stage...problem is, its all downhill from there! For all the above, there is no way it could be ranked lower than 7 however. The IMDb rating has it nailed!