Skyline

Welcome to another episode of Lights....Camera....Popcorn!

Today's review is Skyline. Directed by Colin Strause & Greg Strause A.K.A The Brothers Struase. Written by Joshua Cordes & Liam O'Donnell.

100th review countdown....#91

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some language, and brief sexual content.

Runtime: 92 min

Cast

Eric Balfour - Jarrod

Scottie Thompson - Elaine

Brittany Daniel - Candice

Crystal Reed - Denise

David Zayas - Oliver

Donald Faison - Terry

I mentioned after my Megamind review that I had some fears about this one. I figured that since I had a free movie ticket to use that if this movie sucked that at least it didn't cost me anything but my time.

I WANT MY TIME BACK!!!!

And the real frustrating thing about this is that I can't tell you why.

Jarrod brings Elaine to LA to visit his movie star best friend Terry for his birthday. Aliens invade and basically swoop up all the people. The rest of film is spent with the "main" cast members trying to figure out what their next move is. Whether to flee or stay indoors and wait out the attack.

2010 has been the year of the vampire when it comes to most over saturated genre. Now we are about to be invaded (pun intended) by another wave of alien invasion films. Skyline being the first with Cowboys & Aliens and Battle: Los Angeles to follow this summer. The premise of these films are always the same. Who knows what from who knows where comes to earth and destroys everything until the little people fight back and win the day. For the most part these films are more of a spectacle than a story. You are just treated to cool looking creatures and special effects with very little character or story development from a human standpoint. Then on the off chance that an alien film gives you some sense of character depth like Spielberg's War of The Worlds. The humans are so tumor inducing annoying that you actually root for the aliens to vaporize them. I know I was when I watching that piece of S#&T.

I wonder why writers insist on giving movie goers the option of cool aliens and crappy humans or cool humans and crappy aliens. I don't see why we can't have both. The closest you can come to that is probably Alien and it's sequel but technically they don't count because they don't fit the criteria of an alien invasion film. But those films make my initial point. They had characters you cared about, a compelling story and they were surrounded by cool looking and scary as hell creatures.

Does Skyline accomplish this? Nope but they came close.

The characters are a bunch of C or D listers so you are not invested enough in their survival or demise. Despite that though, the story does do one thing well. They keep the alien invasion a mystery. Way too often in films like this, the creative team struggle to explain why the aliens came and why they are attacking the planet. You don't need to know why when they arrive and start blowing up buildings and killing everyone in sight. That doesn't matter anymore. Skylight doesn't address it. In fact they treat the invasion as realistic as a real invasion would be like. The people try to see if the news has any info and all they see is an empty TV studio still on the air. There's also no scene with the president ordering a full military strike. It just happens. The planes come and fight.

The interaction between the survivors is thought provoking believe it or not. Some want to stay inside. Some want to take the chance and get as far away from the attack as possible. It creates a very interesting debate because both points are valid and understandable. It makes you think what would you do in this situation. If you knew you were under attack by other worldly beings and you had a chance to escape. Would you take the risk knowing that you could very easily be killed if you were seen or would you play it safe hoping that at some point eventually someone will come to your rescue. If there's anyone left that is.

The rest of the film plays this scenario out to it's conclusion and it's here where I left the theater....

FURIOUS!!!!

I really want to tell you why the ending made me so mad but it will spoil it for you if you plan to see it. You might be thinking that I already revealed too much and maybe I did but let's be real here. You're watching an alien invasion movie. What did you expect to see. If you do see this and are still curious why I HATED the ending so much then ask me and I'll be more than happy to tell you.

On the 5 star scale. Skyline gets the goose egg 0 stars. With a split "Save The Loot" "Netflix It" recommendation.

You're probably wondering why I gave it a Netflix rec if I gave it a 0 score. It's because for me the film had some decent stuff here with an ending that had the potential to be GROUND BREAKING in this genre but they played it safe instead.

Such a cowardly and nonsensical move.

That's a wrap for today. Up next is Unstoppable followed by Fair Game.

Until Next episode...."I'll Save You A Seat!"

"D"