It's an alien attack...and it's unexpected. The problem is, it's been done time and time again, and Skyline offers nothing new to this somewhat saturated genre...

It’s a huge shame that in the week the Super 8 trailer had audiences salivating for the next great disaster film, this week’s two examples have been wholly disappointing. While Battle: Los Angeles has moved viewers to laughter with its sheer pomposity, the DVD release of last year’s Skyline manages to be even worse. There’s little here you’ve not seen before, with multi-ethnic groups huddling for survival as the planet comes under attack from an unpleasant alien force. Where Skyline differs most from the likes of Independence Day or Cloverfield is in its comparative lack of quality.

No-one expects heartbreaking dialogue or stirring performances in a disaster flick but Skyline’s predecessors at least spent a little time on character development, however two-dimensional. Here we’re lumbered with a TV movie cast – Scrubs’ Donald Faison is probably the biggest name; though Sweet Valley High’s Brittany Daniel is ageing well – and characters we’re actually quite pleased to see obliterated by a giant alien foot or sucked violently into the pincer-tipped tendrils of the baddies.

Cloverfield kept the action local and deliberately kept the audience as sheltered from the truth regarding the intruders’ motives as it did with the protagonists, but that approach just doesn’t work here. Faison’s unrealistically rich FX specialist is the most obnoxious of the group, but there’s little to like about any of them, and even when the fight for life is twisted into a pedestrian take on Jarrod (Eric Balfour) learning how to become a father, everything’s too risible and formulaic for viewers to care. With little emotive connection to be had, the audience must be able to seek refuge in the film's storyline; or, at the very least, its visual splendour. Unfortunately, such is the ferocity of its failings, Skyline never really manages to get back from this failing – despite a strong visual presence – and the film therefore is always going to struggle.  

Directors Colin and Greg Strause have a strong, special effects pedigree, having worked on the likes of 300, The Day After Tomorrow and X-Men 3 (don’t brag about that one too much guys…), and Skyline impresses you most with its visuals and booming sound design. The biomechanical design of the creatures is intriguing and there’s some memorable imagery as a host of humans are sucked helplessly skywards by the aliens’ entrancing blue lights.

But for every enjoyably ridiculous fight scene – at one stage, Jarrod pulls a seemingly invincible alien’s brain from its body with his bare hands – there’s a cringe-worthy line or an unconvincing effects shot. Effectively an apocalypse play with a small cast, Skyline always feels too cheap and small-scale to ever really convince as a film that deserves anything more than a DVD-only release. Don McKellar’s 1998 indie The Last Night did a far better job of depicting the end of days on a local scale – while still implying the catastrophe was global – and, despite Skyline's best efforts, brain-rips and explosions can only engage so much when a plot’s this familiar and derivative.

As for the ending…not since Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes remake has a climax been so audacious and hilarious. For a fleeting second, viewers might feel a hint of warmth towards Skyline for the Strauses’ boldness in ending their film in such certifiable lunacy. Do not be fooled. Skyline is a cheap and silly disaster film, and a sudden, scientifically-nonsensical final scene – no matter how unpredicted – is not enough to disguise that.

Extras

A fairly comprehensive set, including a commentary from the directors, writer/producer Liam O’Donnell and co-writer Joshua Cordes. Furthermore, the DVD provides a number of deleted and extended scenes, intriguing prospect alternate scenes, pre-visualisation artwork and, predictably, trailers.

See also:

Skyline review

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