Jan 25 2013 10:30am

Upside Down Trailer Sells The Most Impossible Sci-Fi Love Story

Remember the days when the only thing separating two star-crossed lovers was their dueling families or bounty hunters and a block of carbonite? It seems as if in the past few years, high-concept sci-fi films centered around a love story have upped the stakes so much that it should be utterly impossible for the average guy and gal to make it work.

Testing that credibility is Upside Down, where Adam (Jim Sturgess) and Eden (Kirsten Dunst) literally live on two opposite and inverted worlds.

Even though inhabits of Up Above and Down Below are forbidden from interacting, these two have fallen in love. But with the penalty for trespassing being exile or death, Adam’s taking on a major risk when he straps on weights to keep him on the same plane as Eden. (That shot at the end when he passes through two bodies of water? Breathtaking.)

Personally, I feel like I’ve stepped into a wormhole, because it was exactly a year ago that I was reporting on the first Upside Down trailer to hit the web. Perhaps it’s not surprising that it’s taken so long for this unusual film to secure a release date, but every time there are new photos or trailers, they’re met with excitement from eager audiences.

In the past I’ve compared this movie to recent speculative-fiction features Inception and In Time. What makes it so compelling is that it clearly possesses the dizzying visual effects and powerful score of the first. But what will determine if it “rises down” or “falls up” is how badly it clings to groanworthy puns. And “love is stronger than gravity”? Not that great of a tagline.

Oh, and even though everyone’s already said it — bet Kirsten Dunst is glad she mastered that upside-down kiss in Spider-Man.

Upside Down is set to hit theaters in limited release March 15, 2013.

Mike Conley
1. NomadUK
Sci-fi? Not by a long shot. Fantasy, sure.

Looks very pretty. Do wish we could have films that don't always involve lots of black-suited enforcement types with big guns (for which rounds always have to be chambered whilst running) chasing the good guys, however.
Deana Whitney
2. Braid_Tug
Well, at least they aren’t teenagers. I’m tired of all the stories about “true love” when you’re 17. Hell, even Harry Potter meet his wife in High School!

But yes, the movie looks very pretty, and no I don’t have any other relationship with the story.
Natalie Zutter
3. nataliezutter
@NomadUK - Well, I'm not a genre expert. But I usually distinguish fantasy as "multiple worlds" (i.e., nations, dimensions, spheres of magic, etc.) and sci-fi as "multiple planets."

Re: the black-suited enforcers--truth! At least In Time tried to give their police villain a backstory.

@Braid_Tug - Right? Although the first trailer does reveal that Adam and Eden met as kids. Sigh.
Kristen Templet
4. SF_Fangirl
The science is oviously rubbish, but the story looks entertaining and beautiful.

It's cleary fantasy with a sci fi sensability.
Captain Starlight
5. Captain Starlight
You ain't seen - or read - nothin' yet. I tracked down a somewhat elusive friend of mine, and this is what he came up with in the form of a tortured Torch Song:
Marriages Made In Heaven - The Plain Unvarnished Truth
Marriages are Made In Heaven. That is the total truth, neither exaggeration nor wishful thinking. Wishful thinking? Wishful thinking?!?
I don't know how anyone could wish this marriage of mine on anyone!
I'm married, you see.
No, I don't wear a ring, I don't sleep with the person I'm married to, I am responsible for her children, but there is no way in heaven or hell I can see them. But it's a Marriage Made In Heaven, by God Himself, did I forget to tell you?
I wish I could forget how it happened. One fine day, I get a phone call and when I pick up the phone, the person on the other end tells me it's God calling, since dreams have been psychoanalyzed out of credibility. If that's not the worst of it, I get a similar message over the radio, which suddenly cuts out and God's voice cuts in, then drops out again, then my email gets spammed with the same message.
Not a lot you can do in such circumstances, is there?
I couldn't believe the message, either. In a universe totally alien to humanity, where humans could not exist for long enough to regret arriving there, there exists a species of giant highly-intelligent slugs. They're all female, and reproduce parthenogenically.
Parthenogenically? Oh, that means, they reproduce without the benefit of the male sex. Virgin births, the lot of them.
But they need a supportive family to allow them to bring their children to term. And they've just recently got a high-tech civilization up and running, which means that an obscene number can't get close enough to their fellow giant highly-intelligent slugs, to breed. They started to panic about dying out.
So they asked God to intervene, and he being a Good God, and having a lot of affection for them besides, decided to make use of the unattached Earth male phenomenon - the sort of guy I used to be.
Anyway, I got one giant highly-intelligent slug's phone number, and got told my purpose in life now was to ring her up and give her the support she needed. That's her photo - you know now why I was so amused by your suggestion I was starting illustrating for SF magazines.
And those photos are of our children. A certain number get eaten each year by various predators, a certain number die from radiation or gravity disturbances. So far they've survived. Only a mother - or their surrogate alien parent in a totally different universe altogether - could love them. God have mercy on me!
And that's why I feel I'm going around the bend. They do pair-bond - and it lasts for life! No divorce in that situation!
There's no escape!
Yes, Marriages are Made In Heaven. That's the truth! And the only thing I can do is ask God "Why? Why me?"

The END ... of me?
Captain Starlight
6. Quid Squid
This film has actually been out in the rest of the world since last year and is available on blu ray already. I watched this weekend and found it enjoyable, the visuals were especially great.

Looking online at other opinions you see a lot of people complaining about the physics and how the film ignores its own rules, if you just go into it as a film and not tearing apart its physics its definitely worth a watch.

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