Note (07/26/2020): Shane Carruth outed himself as a domestic abuser, so let’s hope he isn’t given the platform to make any more movies. Being a great filmmaker provides no excuse for being a terrible person, and that’s the real reason nobody wants to make movies with him anymore, not because he’s some unparalleled genius.

Shane Carruth's previous film, Primer, is a very clinical and cold film, yet nine years later he returns with Upstream Color, a film grounded in emotion and warmth. This is a film with a love story at its core, and like Primer, the science fiction elements are secondary to the exploration of the character's relationship. Since this film hasn't reached a wide release yet, I will…

"I have to apologize... I was born with a disfigurement where my head is made of the same material as the sun."

one of the only love stories in recent memory that actually *does* make sense. certain films are often (and lazily) described as the kind of thing that you need to see twice, but it truly is sadistically cruel that the end of this film doesn’t immediately loop around to the beginning… not to plug holes, but to heal tissue.

a true headphone movie, if ever there was such a thing, it’s an analog romance about collective memory and fundamental togetherness, elliptically edited to the extreme, but done so with such organic forward motion that - at its best…

Shane Carruth’s belated follow-up to his befuddling debut, Primer, proves no less puzzling yet for markedly different reasons. Primer was intricately plotted yet, given the time and inclination, its multiple narratives could be untangled. Upstream Color is far more abstract and elusive and I suspect clarity will never be forthcoming no matter how many times you attempt to decipher its mysteries. It is also a far more emotionally engaging story compared to the sterile coldness of his time travel darling.

Upstream Color is a woozy and elegiac tale of love, loss and connections. Its story is not easily explained, not without reducing its plot to New Age twaddle, nor easily understood. It is dense, thematically perplexing and hauntingly hallucinatory -…

Shane Carruth’s alluring Upstream Color is Invasion of the Body Snatchers for the art house crowd, with hogs replacing pods and identity crisis substituting for McCarthyism. That may be an awfully crude comparison but it’s the overall gist I got as I watched this beguiling, beautiful film. One thing’s for sure, the plot’s mind-control science fiction aspect plays only second fiddle to the transcendent yet universal overarching theme of emotional resonance in people in the vein of Henry David Thoreau’s literature. This is an ambitious, dense, slippery piece of experimental filmmaking with big ideas and Carruth conveys these enthralling notions through a masterwork in poetic editing, shot composition, and aural design.

First thing going in to this movie is to…

Shane Carruth when asked, what Upstream Color meant, reluctantly said that he does not prefer for it to have any single, specific interpretation. This statement, I comprehended to be his way of indirectly saying that if he were to spell out what it actually meant then it would take all the sheen, mesmerising beauty and the enigma of the film away. This is almost him saying he prefers people to come out with their own ideas and theories of it. Not only Upstream Color, but any abstract form of art deserves to be open to various interpretations, providing fodder for the brains of those who experience it and satisfaction that what they believe is the truth and that it was…

75/100

Second look allowed me to turn off the decoder ring and just revel in the film's associative majesty. In particular, Kris and Jeff's relationship plays very differently when you're aware that it's a separate movement in what's essentially a musical work, heavily influenced by the preceding movement but not a direct continuation of it. That there are multiple oddball metaphors (as opposed to a single overarching conceit à la e.g. Woman in the Dunes) still puts me off a bit, but Carruth glides over the strangeness in a way that forestalls exasperation, and even the stuff I don't quite get, like the pool rocks, makes an intuitive, dream-logic sort of sense. Mostly, it's just a thrill to be in…

I am noticing this film stops working once you can no longer trust Carruth, as character, or as a guiding hand. It's a gentle balance, for a film hanging on it being narratively impenetrable, a so called puzzle movie where the puzzle pieces don't actually explain the scenes we see, it needs to work emotionally for us to understand the connection.

If we can't trust Carruth, and his intentions, the film becomes undefinable b-roll, or worse, a straightforward narrative of control, and the perpetuation of cyclical trauma. We are meant to believe in a healing power of love here, of connection, of recovery and rebuilding life after it falls apart, but what we are given is a different kind of…

More a metaphysical poem than a film, Upstream Color is an elusive and opaque tale of lives lost and found. Told in Carruth's distinct and impressive voice, it is difficult to not be pulled into his mesmerizing world and allow the gorgeous imagery to wash over you.

Trying to find answers in this film's fractal and elliptical narrative is futile and not the point to begin with. It doesn't take too long to figure out that the answers won't come and that Carruth leaves you to your own devices to find your own meaning. The fact that this is done with the littlest of means and to the highest of standards makes Upstream Color an impressive piece of art.

I…

I would like to share with you a Tinder™ convo I had while watching Upstream Color:

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G: Hey Lexi

L: Hi! How are you?

G: I'm doing pretty good, just watching a movie.

L: Ooooh what movie? ;)

G: Upstream Color by the brilliant Shane Carruth.

L: OMG that is like my fav movie!

G: Really? That's awesome, did you watch Primer?

L: yeah yeah sure, Hey for our first date we should read Walden together

G: uh moving a little fast but sure I love Thoreau

L: Great, then you could meet my pigs!

G: lol okay pigs are pretty cute

L: do you like orchids?

G: yeah they're actually my…

I have to apologize. I was born with a disfigurement where my head is made of the same material as the sun.

It's been almost a year since the revelations of Carruth's alleged abuse of Amy Seimetz began to surface. Seimetz wrote, "I am terrified for my safety and I fear that Mr. Carruth's will show up at my home, physically harm me or even kill me." Ever since the story surfaced; since she wrote those words, I have struggled to decide if Upstream Color is worth revisiting. Let me be clear: in no uncertain terms do I want to offer any financial support to an alleged abuser (and I didn't, for this rewatch). At the same time, I do…