Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Skyline (AKA Vagina Aliens a Go-Go)

This is topic Skyline (AKA Vagina Aliens a Go-Go) in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

To visit this topic, use this URL:
https://ft-forum.com/ft/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=001719

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 11-13-2010, 10:42 PM:

Skyline should have been called Attack of the 50ft Vagina Monsters. Freudian film making at it's most unsubtle, it will have psychoanalyst film critic, Slavoj Zizek, giggling like a little school girl as men and women alike are unceremoniously schlupped into belegged feminine alien orifices and their brains and spinal columns plucked out of their skulls (a literal head job, perhaps?) I'm sure there is a cautionary message in this for all of us on the subversive aggression of the female id unfettered by the restrictions of the superego (or some such thing) - hormonal teenagers beware!

In the hands of a director like Paul Verhoeven (its parallels to Starship Troopers in theme, imagery and overt entomological sexualisation are unmistakeable) this could have been a fun, successful and trashy mix but in the hands of "The Brothers Strause" it's just the trash without the underlying subtext (angry vulvas notwithstanding).

This is the kind of movie Roger Corman would have made had he had access to modern CG technology. The Strausians liberally "borrow" ideas, images and entire shots from Day of the Triffids, Alien and Transformers just to name a few. The difference is, Corman's B-movie would have gone straight to DVD.

The film is deliberately structured to get an action scene right off the bat in an effort to stop us from falling asleep during to the following pointless and mind-numbing character exposition. It doesn't work. The same action sequence is unconscionably repeated in its proper chronological place, albeit from a ever so slightly different perspective. Note to The Brothers™: two bites of the orgiastic visual cherry never works. When you've blown your load, you've blown your load, boys.

So what do we know about our heroes? Okay, they have lots of money, they like to party, and the fellas all have pretty wives. Beyond that, we know nothing about them whatsoever. Intriguing character traits are alluded to but are oddly never revealed. It's no suprise that the Strause Siblings have a visual effects background - the script and direction reflects that. The dialogue is universally soap opera dumb and the cast deliver performances to match. A point of particular hilarity occurs when, during all the commotion of the ensuing full scale alien invasion, one of our heroines openly decries the possible harmful effects of another character's smoking on the health of her unborn child. Hilarious! Kudos to the cast for reciting their lines with a straight face, however.

It winds up in a conclusion so wholly underwhelming one wonders whether the script made final draft. The films "twist" is a major anti-climax of "Is that it?" proportions and to finish the story with a sequence of action figure stills is as blindingly underwhelming as its gratuitous use of lens flares. The film looks amateurish and unfinished. Perhaps The Brothers ran out of money?

2 out of 10.

Posted by Michael Voiland (Member # 5386) on 11-14-2010, 01:23 PM:

Production budget was spent on the visuals. They look good. The acting was par / sub par. The plot is interesting might make for some sort of squeal but as it stands now odds are no.

Posted by Jeremy Weigel (Member # 4208) on 11-14-2010, 02:09 PM:

Haven't seen it yet (probably will not either), but just from the trailer it looked like a cross between "War of the Worlds" and "Independence Day".

Posted by Michael Voiland (Member # 5386) on 11-14-2010, 04:05 PM:

Me and a few friends went to it. I no longer work as a projectionist but the visuals were well done the acting was not that great. Watched it on 35mm at an amc showplace 16.

Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 11-15-2010, 11:57 AM:

I didn't find it as horrible as other people.

True it's no award winner, there is alot wrong with it. The acting and character development needs work, so does the actual plot but there is a hidden charm to it. Hidden quite deep down but still there.

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 11-15-2010, 02:57 PM:

^ The words of a man who is truly pussy whipped. [Big Grin]

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 11-15-2010, 05:57 PM:

and the labs can't even do anything right. Between Reels 5 and 6 is a changeover right in the middle of a 6 frame flash scene ... You'd think that they could have made the reel cut prior or after ...

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 11-15-2010, 06:13 PM:

^ Oh yes, that's right. That was pretty ordinary!

Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 11-15-2010, 06:58 PM:

quote: Monte L Fullmer
and the labs can't even do anything right. Between Reels 5 and 6 is a changeover right in the middle of a 6 frame flash scene ... You'd think that they could have made the reel cut prior or after ...

Actually, I believe it's the editors (or maybe the negative cutter) that make the decision on where to place reel changes, not the lab(s).

[Posted from FL370 aboard AS465 (a Boeing 737-800) enroute LAX-SEA [Big Grin]

]

Posted by John Wilson (Member # 269) on 11-15-2010, 10:23 PM:

I hope SEA is an abbreviation for Seattle. [Eek!]

Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 11-15-2010, 11:37 PM:

Wouldn't be if it were an A380. ::badoom tish::

Posted by Barry Floyd (Member # 385) on 11-16-2010, 09:22 AM:

Gotta agree with Stu's assessment of the ending of the film. I watched it on Friday night and I too was like "Is that it?" We had it at the drive-in as a double feature with RED. Honestly, most of the customers were there to see RED.

Posted by Preston Drum (Member # 5903) on 11-20-2010, 06:51 PM:

This Movie should have gone straight to DVD...no actually it should have gone straight to its inevitable sequel- which appears to be a far more interesting than a bland retelling of the H. G. Wells story.