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Science fiction - especially B-movie sci-fi like Leigh Wannell's Upgrade - is a genre that in theory benefits from big budgets, but in practice tends to be more like horror in that the lower the budget and the less that can be made explicit through excessive CGI necessitates more attention to detail, creativity in presentation, space for ideas - and usually better movies. There are auteurist exceptions like Interstellar or Blade Runner 2049, but Upgrade is exactly the kind of fundamentally trashy exercise that has just enough interesting ideas to get itself into trouble and should absolutely not have big stars, explosive effects, or aims any higher than titillating a late night crowd with just enough wit and cleverness to send everyone out on a modest high. And in the vein of mid-tier Carpenter or low-rent early Cronenberg, that's exactly what it does.

Tom Hardy impersonator Logan Marshall-Green plays Grey, a classic-car-renovating technophobe in an automated near-future dominated by voice activated table-computers, self-driving cars, and artificially intelligent body modifications. After he and his wife are assaulted and he's paralyzed from the neck down, a tech billionaire client offers him the illegal, untested opportunity to have a massively powerful chip inserted into his spinal cord, a chance to regain control of his body that he takes and then exploits to hunt down the attackers - also "upgraded" with guns implanted in their arms and ocular implants that allow them to see through walls. This results in the kind of over-the-top violence you might expect from the creator of the Saw franchise, but the eventual outcome is more interesting and subversive than the one that's telegraphed from the opening minutes, and has the leeway to play out its implications in a way that a more expensive movie aimed at the teen popcorn audience likely wouldn't.

Marshall-Green gives a fantastic physical performance that works perfectly with the dark humor of the film, playing up the fact that his head and his body are not always on the same page and making his enhancement feel alienating and disorienting, not purely empowering in the standard manner of fantasies about the weak made suddenly powerful. The supporting cast has some standouts as well, including Benedict Hardie as an unconventional villain and Get Out's Betty Gabriel as the detective trying to unravel what's been done to (and by) Grey.

If you can set your expectations appropriately and you're at all nostalgic for science fiction that's fast, fun, and doesn't look or feel like the bloated franchises debuting every other week these days, Upgrade is plenty refreshing, and hopefully will be successful enough for Blumhouse to justify diversifying their lineup of cheap, hit-and-miss horror releases with more cheap, hit-and-miss swings at this genre (and maybe crime and Westerns as well, while they're at it).

I watched UPGRADE last night. It's written and directed by one half of the original Saw duo (yes, I know) so I went in expecting to want to shut it off after a while; however, I found the film to be largely excellent and a very pleasant surprise. The story is what it is but the film hears the music, for lack of a better phrase. It channels the ultraviolence and the black humour of the original ROBOCOP so well that I don't know that we need another sequel to that film. I need to process the ending of UPGRADE a bit more but the film for the most part just feels, looks and sounds right. It knows what it sets out to do and does it with aplomb. A B-movie alright, but for me, it's a dozen times better than many "A pictures".

Thanks for the reviews, Finch and DarkImbecile. I've only been hearing good things about this, but was wary of a blind buy. Now, not so much!

Logan Marshall-Green should be a major movie star, his performances in this and in The Invitation are very impressive. I hope his career isn’t being held back by the constant Tom Hardy comparisons.

Lost Highway wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 7:41 am Logan-Marshall Green should be a major movie star, his performances in this and in The Invitation are very impressive.

And Quarry. Which virtually no one saw. Which is part of the problem.

His performance in Upgrade and in The Invitation was excellent. That people keep trying to reduce him to a Tom Hardy lookalike (whilst perhaps also implying that he has none of the former's talent?) says more about them than about him.

I mean, I've only seen the trailer for this, but he really does look like Tom Hardy (said with no judgment implied). Venom's trailer not looking all that different from this probably didn't help stop people from making the connection

I praised his performance above, so there's no implicit or explicit judgement of his talent or reduction of his work when I say he clearly looks like Tom Hardy, and to pretend otherwise is absurd.

How do you answer to your post "Tom Hardy wannabe headass LMAO"

I know we're not supposed to use text-speak acronyms, so I'll own that error in judgement, but the rest is a hill I'll die on (especially "headass").

Lost Highway wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 7:41 am Logan Marshall-Green should be a major movie star, his performances in this and in The Invitation are very impressive. I hope his career isn’t being held back by the constant Tom Hardy comparisons.

I was also very impressed with his performance in The Invitation and Quarry. The sense of loss he brought to The Invitation, in particular, was quite moving. Now, I did find much of the acting slightly amateurish in that film (except for John Carroll Lynch), so perhaps comparatively, it was an easy enough level to hit with those surrounding him, but he does seem able to tap into an emotional depth well beyond his years.

The Invitation made me seriously question Karyn Kusama's capability for directing actors, so much so that I can't build up any enthusiasm for her new Nicole Kidman project despite it objectively sounding interesting.

Michiel Huisman simply isn’t a very good actor but I thought the rest of the cast were fine in The Invitation and Tammy Blanchard was excellent. She’s perfect as the type of LA ditz who’d join a new age cult to wallpaper over her grief. If the guests appeared awkward and slightly forced in their jollity, that’s because they were supposed to be. Most of the film is carried by Marshall-Green though, who does fantastic work in a performance that is almost entirely reactive.

They didn't seem like awkward dinner guests, they seemed like bad actors

mfunk9786 wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 9:33 pm They didn't seem like awkward dinner guests, they seemed like bad actors

They probably were!

I can't say there is anything particularly promising about the actor work in Kusama's films; that said, and I probably can't give her much credit here, but there is some very fine actor work in the episodes of "Billions" and "Halt and Catch Fire" that she directed, so it's possible she learned some things from her time doing television after The Invitation and before Destroyer.

I've yet to see Upgrade (waiting on my library hold) but I do think that maybe Logan Marshall-Green is headed towards "bigger and better" things with his career as I've liked him in previous work (and I was impressed by the bits of intensely interesting physical acting he's doing in clips from Upgrade).

Loving the two year crash course theory about directing actors she never know in the fifteen years before.

I like the way that everyone is skirting around Logan Marshall-Green's role in Prometheus

Wow, I sort of remember him now-- was he Noomi Rapace's boyfriend?

domino harvey wrote: Fri Aug 31, 2018 3:58 pm Wow, I sort of remember him now-- was he Noomi Rapace's boyfriend?

That's the guy. Although the re-shoots improved his performance - some of his deleted footage is pretty bad.

I try to forget Prometheus full stop.

colinr0380 wrote: Fri Aug 31, 2018 3:53 pm I like the way that everyone is skirting around Logan Marshall-Green's role in Prometheus

Well, there goes five years of deep therapy trying to forget that film. Thanks Colin!

Ha. Like, a second too late.

colinr0380 wrote: Fri Aug 31, 2018 3:53 pm I like the way that everyone is skirting around Logan Marshall-Green's role in Prometheus

I don't think anybody is skirting around it. He had a supporting role and it even made most the stars in the lead roles look bad. Only Fassbender came out looking good.

John Cope wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 7:50 am

Lost Highway wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 7:41 am Logan-Marshall Green should be a major movie star, his performances in this and in The Invitation are very impressive.

And Quarry. Which virtually no one saw. Which is part of the problem.

Quarry was brilliant. Putting the hardships of Vietnam vets coming home in the context this did felt fresh from a lot of other films that just made them another movie/TV trope to be abused. And Green's performance completely turned me around on him, from his performance in Prometheus which I've joined in on bashing as much as anyone else, admittedly.

As for this, I just watched it and am still processing it all. I was sufficiently mind-fucked by the ending enough to say I feel this could be a great film on it's own merits, but I'd have to give it time.