Upgrade

Aussie director Leigh Whannell's Upgrade borrows narrative elements from a half-dozen films -- primarily Blade Runner, RoboCop, 2001 and Death Wish. Derivative is not always bad, and in this case similarities can be overlooked because Whannell's execution is sure. This is an interesting, though loopy, sci-fi body count flick that stars Charleston (S.C.) native Logan Marshall-Green as Grey Trace, an underemployed mechanic and restorer of vintage muscle cars. Left a quadriplegic in a thugland attack that killed his wife (Melanie Vellajo), Trace finds his way to boy genius scientist Eron (Harrison Gilbertson), who offers him a makeover -- a sentient chip named Stem (voiced by Simon Maiden) that will make him better than new. With his restored mobility and Stem's timely guidance and occasional intervention, Trace hunts the shooters, but obstructions are plentiful and threats are bloody. A tenacious detective (Betty Gabriel of Get Out) suspects Trace has gone vigilante and that he is dispatching with gruesome efficiency some really dirty, enhanced bad guys but she's early on not aware of Trace's Upgrade, and when she does learn of it, Trace and Stem may be too far gone for her to stop.