Haywire (2011)

Haywire is a 2011 talent laden action-thriller film directed by Steven Soderbergh, starring Gina Carano, Michael Fassbender, Ewan McGregor, Bill Paxton, Channing Tatum, Antonio Banderas, and Michael Douglas. Rotten Tomato’s gave it 80%, the film going public failed it.

Gina Carano is a MMA fighter and she is great in this movie. I loved realism of the close combat fight scenes. It’s another agent betrayed on her own movie. But the biggest weakness of this movie is the reason for her betrayal is handled poorly. Overall I thought it was a great action flick and I hope to see more of Gina in similar roles with a better story.

Three point two stars

Upstream Color (2013)

A hallucinatory tale that brilliantly opines on how the worm turns. Observations defying explanations rivet the viewer with a masterful examination of  faith, work, love and eternal legacy. Shane Carruth the genius behind Primer, once again proves he is the odds on favorite to be the 21st century's Orson Wells. Except Carruth operates with total independence and delivers even what the harshest critics would have to admit is a movie that if it were a painting would be a perfect collage of Picasso's best abstracts merged with Salvador Dali's illuminating but confusing narrative.

"In a recent interview with Elvis Mitchell on The Treatment radio show and podcast, Carruth said that he doesn't like to make films that can be easily reduced to synopsis. Films should go to the places that the written word, and other mediums, can't go. Otherwise, what's the point? Not coincidentally, it's a sentiment that can also be applied to science fiction as a genre."

  Although the movie was made on a shoestring budget it looks and feels as big as any blockbuster. Its unbelievable the mind-blowing cinematography was created with a $600  Panasonic DSLM. Carruth served as director, writer, producer, actor, cinematographer, editor, composer, casting director, production designer and sound designer, his romantic partners Oscar worthy performance is portrayed by Amy Seimetz. A cinematic force of nature in her own right. Saying this movie challenges the audience is akin to suggesting the origin of the universe is puzzling. What is art, what is culture, what is the meaning of life, I do not know how to define these things, but I know them when I experience them, Upstream Color is such an experience.

Triumphant total critical acclaim for this movie, do not miss the first movie of the 21st Century.

IO9 picks it as best Sci Fi of 2013, supporting my opinion.

Tens Stars out of Five.