Title: Skyline
Starring: Donald Faison, Eric Balfour, Scottie Thompson
Directors: Brothers Strause
Writers: Joshua Cordes, Liam O'Donnell
Released: 21st March 2011
Length: 94 minutes
From VFX specialists The Brothers Strause comes the terrifying, alien invasion thriller
SKYLINE
DESCENDING ONTO DVD & BLU-RAY 21 MARCH 2011
WHATEVER YOU DO …. DON’T LOOK UP
Jarrod (Eric Balfour) and Elaine (Scottie Thompson) are in LA to see old friends Terry (Donald Faison) and Candice (Brittany Daniel). They picked a bad time to visit because aliens are about to invade. Well I suppose it wouldn’t really matter where they were as the aliens have about a million ships and are literally everywhere. So why would they even decide to invade Earth, they must have vast resources of their own to build such a huge army of ships. Who are these aliens? What do they want? Water? Food? Human blood? Where have they come from? How long did it take them to get here? How come none of them died like aliens normally do? Had they been clever enough to invent inertial dampers and seatbelts? Seems like it. But can they be stopped? Will it be a case of infecting them? Or blasting them with nuclear rockets? Very few of these questions are answered, or indeed asked by any of the dumb-ass characters.
So the aliens begin abducting humans by sending mechanic arms into houses and grabbing people. Exactly like in War of the Worlds. There are also some weird blue lights, ultra violet I imagine as the light sort of irradiates people when it hits them and they are then attracted to it even though it’s probably killing them. The aliens are after human brains, probably to use as an energy source… but who knows?
Skyline is so derivative of every alien movie every made that it’s just plain annoying. It’s ripped off pretty much everything from War of the Worlds to The Matrix by way of Cloverfield and Independence Day and any number of other lesser known sci-fi films.
The digital and visual effects are not especially impressive despite the fact that the directors are a team of brothers – the Strause brothers – who worked on visual effects up to now. They might be going back to it after this… if they are lucky.
Basically if you liked Cloverfield then you will probably enjoy this. I hated Cloverfield as well. I don’t watch films that actively try to make me throw up.
No I didn’t like The Blair Witch Project either – my girlfriend at the time of watching that barfed three times in 90 minutes – at least I only barfed once watching Skyline and it wasn’t motion sickness induced – it was because the film was crap! Hey but don’t take my word for it. This film has plenty of positive reviews.
‘A spectacular and scary sci-fi shocker’ 8/10 ALAN FRANK, THE DAILY STAR
‘Visually dazzling’ CONOR NOLAN, THE PEOPLE
But then that’s what films are about. Some people like ‘em, some don’t. It’s a personal thing. Watch it and make your own mind up… if the alien’s don’t steal your brain that is…
The end of the world has come … and it’s just outside your window
RELEASE DATE: 21 March 2011
DVD & BLU-RAY EXTRAS INCLUDE:
Deleted, Alternate & Extended Scenes, Pre-Visualization, Trailers
