I caught Upgrade recently on Netflix and came away quite impressed. It’s a well-done film which covers some old ground, but managed to be just about original enough to get away with it.
The film follows Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green), and as the film opens, he’s travelling in a self-drive car with his wife Asha (Melanie Vallejo). The car develops a fault and crashes, but then a group of men descend on them, kill Asha and injure Trace so he’s paralysed from the neck down.
We then follow Trace as he tries to rebuild his life … His client, Eron, has developed a computer chip called STEM which will give Trace back his movement, and so he has this implanted, but it soon becomes apparent that STEM has a life of its own, and it speaks to Trace in his mind, encouraging him to take revenge on the men who did this to him.
The film then plays out a fairly standard ‘revenge’ plot, but it’s the conclusions where it shines, with twists and turns you don’t expect, and an ending which is as bleak as they come … but you’ll have to watch it to find out!
The use of near-future tech is great, and Marshall-Green does a tremendous job of acting as immobile, and also when his body is controlled by STEM and moving without his own control …
It reminded me somewhat of the basics of Robocop but it goes off in its own directions, which is no bad thing! Well worth a watch!
A well-done film which covers some old ground
Movie title: Upgrade (2018)
Movie description: Set in the near-future, technology controls nearly all aspects of life. But when the world of Grey, a self-labelled technophobe, is turned upside down, his only hope for revenge is an experimental computer chip implant.
Date published: August 31, 2018
Country: UK
Duration: 1h 40min
Director(s): Leigh Whannell
Actor(s): Logan Marshall-Green, Melanie Vallejo, Steve Danielsen
Genre: Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller
David J Howe, is the author and co-author of numerous books about the TV Show “Doctor Who”, as well as being a freelance writer and Editorial Director of Telos Publishing Ltd.
