In a near-future Toronto, Karsh Relikh runs a cemetery and funeral company after his wife Becca dies from cancer. He creates GraveTech, a system that lets people watch their buried loved ones decay through a screen. When several graves are broken into and the video feeds are hacked, Karsh searches for whoever did it. His search mixes grief, sex, dark humor, and growing fear that he cannot trust his own thoughts.
The film has an unusual sexual subplot. Karsh dates Soo-Min while sleeping with Terry, his dead wife's twin, and he uses an AI assistant based on Becca as a female companion. The story links unusual desire with bodies, death, and technology. An Icelandic protester calls GraveTech a danger to nature and a capitalist lie, while Karsh rejects the Shroud of Turin as fake. These ideas recur around the mystery, but the movie stays centered on one man's private grief rather than race, queer identity, or a broad political campaign.
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Breakdown
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for The Shrouds.
Woke representation / casting
Not present. The film includes women, a blind woman with Hungarian and Korean family roots, and a Chinese doctor, but it does not frame their identities as a diversity message. Their roles serve the grief and mystery plot.
0%
Woke political dialogue
The film includes a clear activist speech from an Icelandic protester. The protester says GraveTech's shrouds may poison the ground and calls Karsh's research a capitalist lie. The plot treats this as one possible reason for the attack. The political dialogue is brief and tied to the mystery.
15%
Identity-driven story themes
The film gives unusual sexual desire a repeated role in Karsh's grief. Karsh dates Soo-Min while sleeping with Terry, his dead wife's twin. The story uses Becca's body and a female AI copy as linked parts of his desire and mourning. These choices challenge ordinary ideas about marriage, sex, and the border between a person and a body, but they do not center race, gender politics, or queer identity.
25%
Western institutional / cultural critique
The film shows Karsh turning grief into a costly business that records and sells access to dead bodies. The story treats the app, AI assistant, and stored body data as invasive tools that can mislead people. Karsh also calls the Shroud of Turin a fake, which undercuts a Christian relic. These ideas create a recurring critique of profit, tech culture, and one religious claim, but the story never offers a full political program.
33%
Woke character or canon changes
Not relevant. The film is an original story about Karsh, Becca, Terry, and Hunny. It does not rewrite a known character, a source story character, or a real historical figure.
0%
Anti-woke backlash and complaints
A small X account called the film “lowkey too woke,” but it gave no clear DEI or identity reason. Another small account linked empty theaters to a wider claim about the film industry's DEI and leftward decline, not to a clear story choice. The search found no boycott, review bombing, or large right-leaning campaign. The anti-woke reaction is therefore fringe and weak.
10%
Creator track record context
David Cronenberg's documented creator score is 40/100. His work often explores sex, gender boundaries, body control, and queer-coded identity. The film uses his usual focus on bodies, sexuality, and technology, so his record matches some visible parts of the movie. The cached producer scores are mostly low to mild, though some producers backed queer or anti-colonial films.
40%
Production
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