Like buses, Hollywood movie ideas come in groups. Beating the COMIC CON-audience wowing trailer "Battlefield Los Angles" by a good few months, SKYLINE is the first "bad aliens" flick out of the gate.
On paper, SKYLINE must have sounded like a sure-fire hit: a world changing event seen from the POV from the little people, not unlike CLOVERFIELD. Also, with a cast of at-best, hopeful wanna-be B-list actors, the audience will constantly be guessing who will survive the ordeal of a planet being attacked from up above. Unfortunately the ordeal is watching the recognisable bit-actors from "24" "Dexter" and "Scrubs" bumble along in a movie that pays attention to how it looks up on the screen rather than how it comes across to the viewers. People are taken, then saved, then taken again so many times that you just don't care about their struggle anymore - and for a survival movie at heart, that's not a good way to go. You need to care and root for them but with the script continually throwing the same "argh!" scenes over and over the mind and emotions are disengaged and you find yourself hoping to see the bright light at the end of the tunnel just like the cast - except yours is the cinema lights coming up.
What you essentially have here is a squandered idea that could have been so much better. With aliens not unlike Spielberg's "WAR OF THE WORLDS" you can't help but wish that the premise landed on someone else's table - Roland Emmerich, Spielberg, heck even Tony Scott would have had a better stab at blending characters that you need to survive with high octane thrills as fighter craft battle overhead against superior firepower.
Never one to ruin an ending, all I can say that The Brothers Strause's approach to their finale is a truly brave piece of movie-making... one that should definately give pause for thought before anyone hires then for another project. To do an ending in the style of "SPIDERMAN's" opening title sequences, and quite an "out there" ending, truly beggers belief! Crazy times!
UK release date: 12/11/10
Certificate: 15
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