DVD Reviews

Skyline – DVD Review

By June L. Mar 21, 2011, 13:49 GMT

It was supposed to be a simple birthday weekend in Southern California. But when sunrise arrives two hours early in the form of a haunting light from an unknown source, a group of friends watch in terror as people across the city are drawn outside and swept into massive alien ships that have blotted out the L.A. skyline. From tankers to drones and hydra-like extraterrestrials, the aliens are inescapable and seemingly ...more

Sometimes you just have to applaud the little guys who do some amazing things with a very limited budget. Such is the case with Skyline, recently exonerated from the “you stole from our film” ranks by a public and formal apology to the Strauss Brothers, creators of the film.

Okay, what is it about L.A. that seems to attract space alien invasions like a magnet attracts iron filings? When given this movie to review, I called on the resident scientist for assistance, as my view of the whole “nasty creature from outer space wants to kill us” story is just that….I don’t see much difference in any of those films.

They all have incredibly ugly creatures that eat, maim or kill humans and they have to be blown up.

Close Encounters, E.T. and Dr. Who are more in my realm of appreciation, although I like good make-up and can be impressed with CG changes to physiology, as long as the story is good.. So with popcorn and drinks, we settled in to watch Skyline which turned out to be entertaining in spite of a weak story, and dialog that at times was just silly.

There have been a lot of bad things said about the film, so we decided to find what was good or interesting. First of all the point of view was different, for the most part the characters were observing all the chaos and destruction from a distance.

They are in a penthouse apartment and this allows for wonderful CG work on a panorama of the city, with creepy creatures, both flying and walking and explosions and lights.

In several scenes, they are watching people being hauled up into space ships by some force like schools of fish are hauled into boats by a fishnet.

As you watch Skyline, you may be reminded of 1950’s and 60’s science fiction films, in which there were standard characters, the hero, the heroine, the good hearted goofball who is the first to get killed, etc. Unlike those films, there is no easy ending for Skyline. There is no last minute cavalry raid to save the characters, but it is not the end.

There is a sequel planned, and it has been planned from the beginning, which isn’t unusual these days, but this film’s “ending” really does set some things up to be explained. Not that much is divulged in the film, but then neither was there much told in those old sci-fi films we grew up watching.

It is alien, from outer space, therefore it is incomprehensible. The resident scientist agrees that the dialog is silly, but the creature climbing the building is cool, and the flying thingies that search out humans in the buildings and swallow them are just gross, but again interesting as they kind of look like air-squids.

The ships are daunting, and just try to figure out the hierarchy of these creatures….who the heck is in charge?

Skyline is presented on single disc with a running time of 1 hour and 34 minutes. There are several commentaries which are interesting to hear. One of the brothers uses his own condo as the Penthouse condo in the filming, and we get to hear the problems and the pluses for using a location that one knows. The actual valet parking guy gets a film cameo, and several family members as well as the brothers and the writers are used as extras.

Considering this film was made for about ten million and grossed 65 million, I think they came out ahead. We are giving it four stars for effort.