💬 Review Upgrade by nomevisss

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nomevisss

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A man with disabilities get an experimental surgery to recover limbs functionality, with the intention of kill the people who assassinated his wife.

Review:
I usually plan what to see, and i don't like to get carried away by the surprise of seeing something that starts promising and continue with it; i plan movies that have some merit (good script, use of color, direction, soundtrack), cult movies, recommendations from other people that I know have similar tastes, not with this one.

I was in my room reading, ignoring what was happening on TV when I saw the first scenes and I swore it was Venom, because its main actor Logan Marshall, looks just like Tom Hardy, for 15 minutes I fed that notion having an argument with myself out loud like:


- ‘’THAT IS TOM HARDY’’ – I point to the TV with my left hand while my right hand keeps the Tablet in balance.


-''No, it's another movie'' - I stop pointing at the TV.


-‘’WAIT THAT IS VENOM’’ – I put the Tablet aside to pay full and active attention to the TV.


-“It's not Venom because he's not a robot” – I take the initial position.

After they started talking about bioengineering, i knew it wasn't venom, but i continue watching out of curiosity:

This film deserves a lot of credit considering that it had a budget of $3 million with the outstanding cinematography. and seeing the film does not reflect or project, it would seem that it had much more, the people who managed the funds and the production team deserves an award by itself… This aspect is incredible and changes according to what the scene needs, action scene? scene with a climax? suspense? no problem bro, they got you. It has its dimension and effectiveness thanks to the work of Stefan Duscio, impeccable.


The balance between the black humor and the action sequences are great, this fusion comes out on the first fight scene; Gray (the protagonist) does not have the fighting skills and STEM can use his body to "defend" him, when he used the knife to slash Tolan's face (one of the criminals), the first death; the juxtaposition between a body language that knows what it is doing and know that it is capable of using its body, with the expressions of the actor because he doesn't know what to do and he's very scared, and don't want to killed anybody… A huge credit to the stunt doubles for the choreography, very realistic and stylized.


The animation sequence when Flick spits and it's nano-robots that kills the bartender, the shots from the weapons built into the arms, Flick's vision, the surgery scene (the contrast when he goes through the MRI panels of Grey's skeleton), images of the violence scenes in the fights... So good , and again, considering the budget; well done special effects, it noticeable people who have a lot of experience in their jobs make this movie.


Although there were more angle changes than I like; the action sequences are very well presented and it looks fluid in the final result, between the animations, the scenes focused on the physical environments and the animation sequences like Flick's vision, or Grey's back surgery scenes. They looked good and the inmersion it's not at least for me; damaged or badly influence to the viewer.


The performance of the entire cast (even the few minutes of screen time that Grey's mother was on) was a collaborative aspect with a good job of interdependence, great work than come from again; a very experienced and talented team who help materialize and made the movie, work.


The ending i didn't like it, the script was decent and the storytelling was good... But the ending didn't impress me, i expected it from my experience in that kind of techno-dystopian movies, i think it could have had a different development than even though the ending would be predictable, STEM take control of Grey's body and started going mad-man in the streets.


The direction it was not much to my liking because in certain scenes there are unnecessary angles, and others that could be better, such as the bar scene when Gray enters, makes his presentation, the confrontation with Tolan and when he leaves (it could be a long shot) or the scene where the car falls into the middle of the dump.


The production design was disruptive sometimes with the believability of the futuristic setting; if it weren't for the special effects, story, cinematography and one scene in particular; to people within the virtual world. I wouldn't recover the inmersion, but at times when some of the effective characteristics were present i could get it back, it gave the environments more the impression that they were in popular areas in industrial neighborhoods than 60 years in the future (from 2022).



I didn't I like the STEM voice, they producers forced a lot to make it sound like a robot, thanks to movies that deal with robotic characters like Terminator (1984), A.I: Artificial Intelligence and Her; left an impression in me with a different liking of the development of robotic characters and the performance of those who have the role, and not the usual metallic type of voice along zero sentimentality; STEM wanted to become human since he was in Grey's body, but that idea have to come somewhere; there's two characters inside Grey's, and they could develop STEM instead of just using the overused (and tbh, uncreative and borderline lazy trope) of the anhedonic robot, and more if it have a human transition type of arc.

Would you recommend this to other users? If you like techno drama movies, yes.

Rating(1-5): ⭐⭐⭐⭐
 
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