Review of Upstream Color (2013) by Nikolas C — 20 May 2013

"Upstream Color" starts with a couple of guys discovering slugs that allow them to share minds. That biotechnology falls into the wrong hands(Thiago Martins). He first tries to introduce them via a drug in a nightclub before falling back onto plan b which involves tasering Kris(Amy Seimetz) and dragging her outside into the rain, where he forcibly injects one into her. Hypnotically, he proceeds to clear out her bank account and rare coin collection before leaving. Kris awakens to an audio signal from an engineer(Andrew Sensenig) who leaves her in her car on a highway median with no memory of what happened.

Instead of using physics, Shane Carruth(who also co-stars) uses biology this time around in "Upstream Color" to not only play with viewers' heads but also to literally get under their skin.(What next? Chemistry?) Without explaining much of anything, he looks at how two people try to put their lives back together after losing everything and being violated in such a way. That having been said, sometimes it seems like the pigs have the more compelling storyline. Plus, Carruth is at his best when he is being ambiguous, not when he is trying so hard to connect the dots to tie everything neatly up. And I don't see how "Walden" works into the larger narrative, such as it is, when any book would have sufficed, even "The Little Prince" which actually would have been kind of funny.