Skyline

You know sometimes you see a trailer and you think “Wow, that looks good”? And you know sometimes that the trailer just doesn’t match up?

Skyline

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Aliens appear, start snatching people for no reason and stuff blows up. Erm… yeah. That’s it.

Skyline is kind of like seeing a gorgeous pizza covered with all your favourite toppings, taking a huge bite and finding it’s made out of polystyrene. It’s all air, fluff and appearances with no actual nutritional value. It has its use as eye candy but it’s ultimately completely unsatisfying.

It starts very promisingly, with the aliens arriving pretty much in frame one. This lasts five minutes then we’re taken back to “15 hours earlier” for some pointless character development of our small group of “heroes”. We than catch back up and get to enjoy the same footage we just saw repeated.

The film hinges on the effects which are very well done. Sadly, even an effect-driven movie needs a decent story and that’s where Skyline falls down very badly. Even Independence Day has a plot of some kind and some fairly witty dialogue. Skyline even lacks witty one-liners. One of the biggest jumps in the film is in the trailer, so that’s been spoiled.

Despite the incredible effects, they’re unoriginal. The floaty aliens look like squids from the Matrix movies. Until they land when they become more like the bugs from Starship Troopers. Then there’s the huge, towering monsters which bear more than a passing resemblance to something I remember from the first Quake game.

As far as highlights go, the helicopter scene is pretty cool. And the aerial battles with what’s left of the air force. That’s about it, frankly.

Oh, and the ending. Good grief, how awful. While I’m fine with there being no explanation for the technology, or the reason for the invasion (it’s missed only as ever other films ends up going down this road, but it’s realistic – would we ever find that out?) what I couldn’t stand was the rushed and incredibly cheesy naffness of the closing five minutes. It’s almost as if it was tagged on as an afterthought. Alternatively, someone looked at their watch during production and decided the film had gone on too long and they only had 10 minutes including end credits left so they just had to shoehorn in the first piece of crap that came to mind.

And despite all Â this, Empire magazine gave it film of the week on their weekly email with 3/5 stars. Which makes even less sense given that another film on the same mail was awarded 4/5. I’ve never understood magazines that do that.

Worse, though – Skyline 2 is already in production. I’m fairly sure that’ll be joining Avatars 2 and 3 on my “don’t bother” pile.