In cinema there are ideas that really excite the cinephiles. Troubled film productions are one. Director cuts are another. Censored films yet another. Some of these are falling by the wayside thanks to modern technology or to pioneering people seeking to find and release uncensored films. But one of the most enduring is filming the unfilmable. Some famous film makers have tried it. Success has been mixed. Losers have seen Zack Snyder try, Paul Thomas Anderson and Lynch another (I liked DUNE mind). Winners, well there was Villeneuve, Strick and…maybe Cronenberg. David Cronenberg is one director who tried. Twice in fact. COSMOPOLIS was neither good nor bad. The other was 1991 NAKED LUNCH. This point is not lost on any of the extras on the discs. Nor was it on the US Criterion collection release, which this improves on. Both spent time reflecting on how Cronenberg achieved the feat and also allowed the more autobiographical elements of Burroughs work to surface.

William Lee (Peter Weller) makes ends meet as an exterminator. He had a taste for powder. A taste for the junk. His wife Joan (Judy Davis) discovers that the bug spray her husband uses to kill crawling monsters, has hallucinatory properties, they both become hooked. But the powder let Insects speak, typewriters mutate, and lead them into the interzone, a world that is neither interdimensional and multiverse. Crime and Arabic script, weird sexual mores and less conscious connections. All for the ultimate prize.

4K releases have become a mixture. Usually, in the case of say Arrow, it is solid visually but them compromised on a UHD transfer that doesn’t supersede its original. This has changed for the better, with the whole thing standing flush as a dream hand at cards. Light, warmth, lossless depth and extremely magnetic. Now I liked Criterions vision (for that was what it was). Visually this trumps it by a way. Related in the commentary by Cronenberg is the light and dark of the film, for his ’Middle Eastern’ Flavour is his ambition. So to speak. This is an old commentary and is propped up by being from a great vision. But I now prefer Jack Sargeant and screenwriter Graham Duff take. It illuminates the crevasses and tells the bugs to scatter. Its more film than book but it defines the way an unfilmable work, delivers to us in multiple ways. The interviews refresh the film and bring lovely people to the fore. Some have good things to say about the personal power of NAKED LUNCH. Tony Rayns on William S. Burroughs is where you find everything you need know about how the beat, got onto the screen. I still want that JUNKY film mind…it will never happen.

New 4K restoration from the original camera negative overseen by director of photography Peter Suschitzky and approved by director David Cronenberg

• 4K (2160p) Ultra HD Blu-ray presentation in Dolby Vision (HDR10 compatible)
• Original lossless 2.0 stereo and 5.1 audio options
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Audio commentary by director David Cronenberg
• New audio commentary by film historian Jack Sargeant and screenwriter Graham Duff
• Naked Attraction, a new interview with legendary producer Jeremy Thomas
• Exterminate All Rational Thought, a new interview with star Peter Weller
• Peter Suschitzky on Naked Lunch, a new interview with the celebrated director of photography
• Naked Flesh, a new interview with special effects artist Chris Walas
• A Ballad for Burroughs, a new interview with composer Howard Shore
• Tony Rayns on William S. Burroughs, a new interview with the renowned writer and critic
• David Huckvale on Naked Lunch, a new interview taking a closer look at one of Shore’s most unusual film scores
• A Ticket to Interzone, new visual essay by critic David Cairns
• Naked Making Lunch, archival making of documentary directed by Chris Rodley presented in a new scan from the director’s personal 16mm print and viewable with a new audio interview with Rodley discussing his connection to Cronenberg and the process of making Naked Making Lunch
• Concept Art Gallery, a collection of drawings and maquettes for the creatures of Naked Lunch by Stephan Dupuis
• Theatrical Trailer
• Image Galleries, including never before seen stills from the set courtesy of Chris Rodley
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Gilles Vranckx
• Double-sided poster featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Gilles Vranckx
• Six postcard-sized reproduction lobby cards
• 80-page perfect bound collector’s book featuring new writing by critics Vanessa Morgan and Jack Sargeant, plus select archival material including David Cronenberg’s introduction to Everything is Permitted: The Making of Naked Lunch, and a chapter from Cronenberg on Cronenberg