History Film / DeadRingers

* CanadaEh: Toronto is given as the setting for the majority of the film (with the exception of one scene near the beginning set in a university in America). It's a fairly realistic depiction without any stereotypes. Also Geneviève Bujold is actually French-Canadian, and while it is not explicitly stated whether her character Claire is as well, her last name (Niveau) and accent would suggest that to be the case.

The twins then embark on a medical procedure to separate themselves for health reasons. Has it been mentioned that they aren't ''conjoined'' twins?

Getting Elliot's sloppy seconds begins to tire Beverly, and he sets out to get a woman on his own. He makes the big personal leap of dating actress Claire Niveau (Creator/GenevieveBujold). Unfortunately, Beverly is a jangled bundle of neuroses, and when Claire goes out of town to work on a film and Bev calls her hotel room only for a man to answer, Beverly jumps to the conclusion that she is cheating on him.

The film is set to be remade into a [[Series/DeadRingers2023 television series]] for Creator/AmazonPrime on April 21, 2023, with Creator/RachelWeisz taking over the role(s) of Elliot and Beverly.

* {{Identical Twin ID Tag}}s: As the story progresses, Beverly and Elliot's personalities diverge due to one of the twins' advancing mental instability. This is reflected in their appearance, with Elliot maintaining a healthy, well-tanned look while Beverly develops bags under his eyes, a sickly pallor, and a nervous twitch.
--> Beverly's the sweet one...and you're the ''shit.''

* GenderBlenderName: Claire points out that ''Beverly'' is considered a feminine name.
** Beverly calls his brother "Ellie," and while Claire is more common as a woman's name, it can be a male name as well (Clare).

* CatapultNightmare: Beverly falls from his bed after a NightmareSequence where Claire separates him from his brother Elliot by [[{{Squick}} chewing through the connective tissue]].

* MarketBasedTitle: The original name of the film was ''Twins'', but it had to be changed thanks to [[Film/{{Twins}} the Schwarzenegger/DeVito film]] coming out first.

* WiseBeyondTheirYears: Elliot and Beverly as kids, as they discuss evolution, sex, and reproduction.

* PingPongNaivete: The twins as children know an awful lot about sex, reproduction, evolution, and anatomy, and yet know nothing of social boundaries and even have some of their notions about sexual evolution wrong. They think if humans were an underwater creature we wouldn't have sex and lay eggs like fish, but humans are mammals, and underwater mammals like dolphins and whales do have sex.

* BerzerkButton: Don't call attention to the fact that Beverly is usually a woman's name.

* ActingYourIntellectualAge: The twins as children, who act nothing like children at all and much more like little scientists.

* MistakenForCheating: Beverly thinks that Claire cheats on him because a coworker answered on the phone of her hotel room. She was just having a profesional meeting in her room.
* NightmareSequence: There's one in the middle of the film and it is pretty... [[BodyHorror disturbing]]. Beverly is sleeping with Claire. Elliot shows up and Claire suggests to separate Beverly from Elliot. Then she starts biting a sort of umbilical cord that links the twins together.

* SanitySlippage: Because of his addiction to meds, his jealousy and his difficulty to live independently from his brother, Beverly becomes increasingly insane. He begins seeing genital mutations in his patients that do not really exist. [[spoiler:But the madness spreads to Elliot via [[{{Synchronization}} twin osmosis.]] This leads to them using a scalpel to perform a "separation procedure", AKA a murder-suicide]].

* SpiritualAntithesis: To the film Cronenberg made immediately before this, ''Film/TheFly1986''. Both are adapted from written works. Each is a PsychologicalThriller {{Tragedy}} with only a few significant characters in which a man's jealous love for a woman inadvertently sends him into SanitySlippage. Both involve extensive special effects and a lead actor ''seriously'' committed to their performance on physical and mental levels. But where ''The Fly'' is a science fiction film involving a transformation into both a HalfHumanHybrid and MadScientist with extreme amounts of onscreen BodyHorror, this is a more realistic story of someone who becomes a MadDoctor and BodyHorror is more suggested than shown. Where ''The Fly'' involves two entities (the scientist and a housefly) merging into one with the special effects turning Creator/JeffGoldblum into that creature, this involves two entities trying to separate themselves -- the doctor and his twin -- with special effects allowing Creator/JeremyIrons to play both. The visuals, acting, and tone are icy and chic here, whereas ''The Fly'' is warmer and dowdier. The trailer actually positioned it as this trope in its narration (and used RecycledTrailerMusic from its precursor): "From David Cronenberg, who in ''The Fly'' made the fantastic real...Now, David Cronenberg makes reality the ultimate fantasy."
* TogetherInDeath: A particularly wrenching example. [[spoiler:When the twins reach the nadir of their breakdown, they perform a "surgery" where Beverly effectively eviscerates Elliot. After he realizes what he's done, Beverly makes one final, abortive attempt to connect with his new paramour. He instead decides to join Elliot in death, cradling his brother's body.]]

* {{Twincest}}: The interactions and dependency of the brothers seem to have this sort of subtext, sharing details about their sex lives as if comparing homework. TruthInTelevision in that many twins are emotionally and physically intimate in ways disturbing to the untwinned, but the brothers take it well beyond that; especially on Elliot's end, like when he tried to initiate a threesome with Beverly and got jealous and took over when his brother needed CPR.
* TwinSwitch: The Mantle twins do it regularly with the women they date. As far as Claire is concerned, she first meets Beverly during a consultation, then she has a date with Elliot and has sex with him. Her next date is with Beverly who has sex with her too... and Claire thinks that she is always with the same person. She does not even know that Beverly has a twin brother.

Getting Elliot's sloppy seconds begins to tire Beverly, and he sets out to get a woman on his own. He makes the big personal leap of dating actress Claire Niveau (Creator/GenevieveBujold). Unfortunately, Beverly is a jangled bundle of neuroses, and when he sees the girl he's set his eyes on meeting with a coworker, Beverly jumps to the conclusion she is cheating on him.

[[SanitySlippage Cue descent into delusional hell]], wherein Beverly begins [[MadDoctor performing unnecessary operations]] with [[CowTools custom gynecological tools]] on women who he believes have "mutant genitalia". When the effects of his declining mental health spill over into the brother's practice, the board of health suspends Beverly's license. Elliot, who had always been sensitive to his sibling's fragility, leaves his practice and his current love interest to join Beverly, who has holed himself up in their apartment.

* AlwaysIdenticalTwins: Beverly and Eliott are identical twins, played by the same actor, Creator/JeremyIrons.

** A disturbingly subtle one for what's ''not'' shown is Beverly's diagnosis of Claire; the reason she can't get pregnant is because she has three uteruses, each with its own cervix. When Beverly calls Claire and gets her (male) receptionist, he believes she's cheating on him -- and tells him about her condition. Claire's actually a good sport about it; she's already accepted Beverly's neuroses, and is less disturbed by the confidentiality breach than she is by her receptionist's reaction -- he was a FlamboyantGay ''before'' Beverly accused him of "fucking a mutant", which grossed him out beyond recognition.
* CanadaEh:
** Toronto is given as the setting for the majority of the film (with the exception of one scene near the beginning set in a university in America). A fairly realistic depiction without any stereotypes. Also Geneviève Bujold is actually French-Canadian, though it is not explicitly stated whether her character Claire is as well.
** Her last name (Niveau) and accent would suggest that to be the case.
* CatapultNightmare: Beverly falls from his bed after a NightmareSequence where Claire separated him from his brother Elliot.

* DaydreamSurprise: Beverly is sleeping with Claire. Elliot shows up and Claire suggests to separate Beverly from Elliot. Then she starts biting a sort of umbilical cord that links the twins together. Cut to Beverly waking up. This was just a nightmare.

* EvilTwin: Zig zagged. In the beginning, Eliott is presented as a complete jerkass, while Beverly seems to be a rather NiceGuy in contrast with his brother (even if using a BedTrick is clearly not something nice). In the end, Beverly becomes a MadDoctor and Eliott is the more sensible and the less dangerous of the two.

* GenderBlenderName: Claire points out that ''Beverly'' is considered as a feminine name.
** Beverly calls his brother "Ellie." And while Claire is more common as a woman's name, it can be a male name as well (Clare).