eXistenZ

1999 Directed by David Cronenberg

Play it. Live it. Kill for it.

A game designer on the run from assassins must play her latest virtual reality creation with a marketing trainee to determine if the game has been damaged.

Jennifer Jason Leigh Jude Law Ian Holm Willem Dafoe Don McKellar Oscar Hsu Callum Keith Rennie Christopher Eccleston Sarah Polley Robert A. Silverman Kris Lemche Vik Sahay Kirsten Johnson James Kirchner Balázs Koós Stephanie Belding Gerry Quigley

Alternative Titles

Crimes of the Future, eXistenZ - Du bist das Spiel

science fiction thriller horror action

97 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Kenned Lehmann ★★★★★ 6

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

This is really one of my all time favorite movies, but i might be in the minority. I can understand why it get so much hate from some people, it's not exactly breaking new ground with the whole "reality vs. illusion" theme, and it's a very strange, creepy and trippy movie. Also the acting is not always the best.
So why do i like it so much? Well, eXistenZ has something that none of the other "reality vs. illusion" movies have, in my oppinion of course. Im not saying that eXistenZ is particularly clever, deep or philosophical, not on a logical level anyway. While other "reality vs. illusion" movies can make me question reality - just a little bit at…
Review by brat pitt ★★★½

extra half star because jude law says "i have this phobia about having my body... penetrated"
Review by Neil Bahadur ★★★★★ 5

Maybe my favorite Cronenberg now - layers and layers of "spaces" overlapped until the distinction between the virtual and the real can no longer be distinguished. This is constructed so meticulously - placing characters within a virtual world, governed by virtual laws - but this also depicts the virtual-nature of our basic standards of living: you wake up, you eat, you go to work, you have lunch, you go home, you have dinner, etc. In-between, everything becomes a game: alliances, relationships, sex, even eating food. By the end, we have no clue whether we are seeing a "game" or "reality." But it doesn't matter - for Cronenberg, they're one and the same. Masterpiece.
Review by Tony the Terror😼🏳️‍🌈 ★★★★★ 10

Hooptober V
21/31: selected directors

Can you even believe I had never seen this before? I can’t really believe I had never seen this before, but then I kinda can because it came out during my super heavy party days and I was too Busy Philipps for a movie. But still, I never got around to it til now wtfffff. I also can’t believe that Cronenberg isn’t a name I often shout out when rattling off my favorite directors to anyone who will listen, but that’s probably because I’m a little bitter about him straying from the true horror path although even his newer stuff is pretty amazing so maybe I just need to bring him into the top tier fold.…
Review by PTAbro ★★★ 3

It's been a while since a finale has turned my opinion of a film from the negative to the positive so quickly and completely, but with eXistenZ, Cronenberg manages to salvage most of the confusion and campiness of the preceding 80 minutes and actually makes it work, marginally. Make no mistake - the rest of the movie is bizarre, sloppy, and really only worthwhile for the visual ingenuity of Cronenberg's obvious delight in practical effects and their implementation. However silly the rest of it is - terrible accents, ludicrous scenarios even in the context of the film universe, and a seeming disregard for conventional narrative structure - I had to begrudgingly applaud Cronenberg for fooling me so completely.
So. Does…
Review by Disgustipated ★★★★

Hooptober 5.0 - 2018 - Film #18
In true Cronenberg fashion, this is your typical metaphysical mindfuck. Blurring the lines between psychosis and simulated reality, the characters in this movie are immersed in a virtual reality game called Existenz to the point that they no longer know what is real and what is not. Instead, they find themselves lost in a set of Babushka doll like game worlds.
Tellingly perhaps, The Matrix and The Thirteenth Floor were also released the same year, both of which delved into similar fare. Virtual reality, phenomenology and metaphysics were definitely in the Gatorade that year (even if Fassbinder beat them all to the punch decades prior with Man on a Wire).
Interestingly, Cronenberg suggests…

Recent reviews

Review by Julian Nicolas ★★★½

Now I know where the inspiration for Inception came from...
Review by Dan Hodges ★★★½

Some of the dialogue is a little clunky and Jude Law is inconsistent as ever, but there's a wonderfully creative and vivid appeal to the whole film that carries it through its rougher moments. A couple of brief supporting players liven things up, too, particularly Willem Dafoe's sleazy gas stop owner "Gas", while the movie moves at a breezy pace as to never grow stale or weary.
Review by Peter Walkden ★★★

Allegra (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is a video game designer. The film opens with a small group of people and Allegra introducing her newest game creation called “eXistenZ”. She invites people within the group to participate with the new gaming experience. But just as she begins to load the game with her volunteers, someone from the crowd tries to kill her. Rushing to her aid is the security guard, Ted (played by Jude Law). The two then go on the run trying to escape the assassins. To top it off, Allegra’s gaming pod which has the one and only copy of eXistenZ now appears to be damaged. Now it’s up to Allegra and Ted to enter the game to ensure the…
Review by laura vitale ★★★★ 1

nao sabia que a lana del rey era atriz atriz tbm
Review by piolho ★★★★

cabos biologicos e depois cabos como conhecemos
Review by Stuart Inamura ★★★★★

Damn this movie rules... forgot how completely bonkers it is. Cronenberg said fuck exposition and just throws the wildest shit at you with no explanation at all. Bone guns that shoot teeth and lumpy pink glowing cell phones? I’m 100% on board!!
Review by Bea Pratte ★★★½

I can't believe he brought us the game pod goddess herself, Allegra Geller
Review by dweebusmaximus ★★★

A very strange puzzle of a movie that I was desperate to solve. Cronenberg’s trademark body horror is on full display with some excellent tech noir paranoia.
I do have to knock some points off for a story that didn’t feel complete. This is a very short movie that could have benefitted with another 15 to 20 minutes.
David Cronenberg has always been a mixed bag for me, but this is a film I wouldn’t mind watching again and seeing if there were any secrets I may have missed.
Review by Zackswatching ★★★★★

Now that I'm older, this movie fits together better for me. It is another of Cronenberg's neo-noirs (a form he employs often but rarely gets credit for helping to perfect). It's probably not in sync with any modern gaming developments, but it's an intriguing movie all the same.