Blue Sunshine Reviews

This excellent second feature from SQUIRM director Lieberman veers into early Cronenberg territory with its harrowing combination of detective, horror, and sci-fi genres. King stars as a man, on the run for a murder he committed in self-defense, who uncovers the solution to a string of killings that has been plaguing a comfortable suburb. It seems that, 10 years ago, a Stanford professor (Goddard) created a form of LSD, dubbed Blue Sunshine, and administered it to several students in the name of science. Now--when all the human guinea pigs are well-to-do, middle-class members of society--a delayed chromosonal imbalance is kicking in, resulting in the subjects' sudden hair loss and an uncontrollable rage that makes them kill. Goddard, in the meantime, has gone into politics, and it is up to King to reveal the results of his horrible experiments. Intense, but at the same time quite offbeat and humorous, BLUE SUNSHINE presents a truly memorable and effective condemnation of American middle-class values. As in the underrated SQUIRM, Lieberman directs with genuine flair and does a nice job of keeping the audience off balance by alternating genuinely funny passages with unforgettable moments of sheer horror. Highly recommended.