Upstream Color (***1/2 out of ****)

Shane Carruth has directed one other feature, it was called Primer. It was a mad mans take on time travel and the continuity affects. Looking at all the paradoxes the notion creates. The film in itself is similar to a homework assignment. It needs to be analyzed and studies so that sense can be made of it. It's a film that makes one think, I pushed my self to understand it and shouldn't an art form cause some stress. How does one learn if they are not challenged or willing to work? Shane Carruth returns nearly a decade later with Upstream Color. The director did not lose his touch in creating a haunting and dizzying experience.

I've said in the past that it can be difficult in describing a plot, this might be the hardest. So Kris (Amy Seimetz) is out at a nightclub one night where she is drugged. However it is not some regular chemical, but a bug like organism. It causes a hypnosis state that allows for the mind to be altered. It destroys her life. Some time later she meets Jeff (Shane Carruth), who has the same thing happened to them. They begin seeing each other and everything should be ok. However their identities become intertwined, memories confused, and pasts entangled. The organism that once was in them lives in a  new host and the effects are still there. Fear and panic set in.

When I say that Shane Carruth is an artist, I don't take that word lightly. The director through an powerful story, meaningful jump cuts, and a sense of mystery makes this a strong contribution to cinema. Instead of approaching this film as something that needed to be solved like Primer, he looks to analyze a question that cannot be answered, only to give some insight. Carruth looks at the condition of life and what drives it, where it begins and what is held sacred in it. It's a intoxicating odyssey  that needs and deserves interpretation.

***1/2 out of ****