http://advancescreenings.com/2010/07/comic-con-preview-skyline/ your source for free advance movie screenings! Wed, 16 May 2012 21:26:00 -0700 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 http://advancescreenings.com/2010/07/comic-con-preview-skyline/comment-page-1/#comment-661 REVIEW: Skyline | advancescreenings.com Fri, 12 Nov 2010 20:40:12 +0000 http://advancescreenings.com/?p=725#comment-661 [...] Skyline was laughable. This is a contender to be one of the worst films to be put on the big screen this year. Even though it’s kind of amazing how this movie was made and for how small the budget was, people will expect a big blockbuster movie going into the theater and they will be very disappointed. For a movie that was a social commentary about human society via an outright alien invasion, Skyline was more of a comedy of how poorly written and cliche a movie can be. The movie begins with blue lights falling from the sky. Like a car crash, everyone is captivated by what’s going on and is attracted to the light like bugs to a bug zapper. But you don’t want to look into this light. Instantly, it starts taking control of your body and pulling you towards it. You join a group of beautiful-looking friends in their apartment as they try to figure out what to do. This isn’t your typical alien movie. They don’t hide their monsters at all. Skyline was created by the Brothers Strause (Colin and Greg Strause) who own Hydraulx which is a special effects company which has worked on big studio movies like Iron Man 2, 300, and Avatar. I was actually underwhelmed by the visual effects of the film but with a ten million dollar budget, it was still impressive…we’ll get more into that later. How crazy would it be if you woke up to that one morning... Skyline follows the initial group of friends as they run around their apartment complex trying to run away from the alien hordes. They inevitably run into a never ending supply of characters we don’t care about that can be killed and allow the movie to roll on. The acting is pretty sub par all around the cast except for Donald Faison and Scottie Thompson. The character depth is nonexistent and the only character with cajones is Oliver, the Hispanic concierge. I’m surprised more people didn’t walk out in my screening and I’m sure many people will be throughout the weekend. You can only laugh more at the next scene until the ending which is completely ridiculous and basically sums up the movie. You’ll leave the theater saying, “Really?” Typical slowly dying acting The only good elements of the film I could think of were some quick moving scenes that surprise you. If you’re expecting to be scared and jump out of your seat there may be two or three parts that will get you but you’ll either be laughing before, after, or doing them. There are scenes reminiscent of Independence Day and Cloverfield but Skyline is no where near any of those movie’s levels. The background music is annoying and keeps trying to sound epic and uplifting when anything “positive” happens and then quickly draws back when the characters realize what they thought worked…didn’t. This happens repeatedly throughout the film and really peeved me. Almost everything in this pic was computer generated...amazing The way Skyline was made is incredible in itself. The Strause brothers sat down with their creative friend and decided to make a movie independently on their own without a studio. They owned their own special effects studio (which is the bulk of this film), they had camera and lighting friends, friends to do sound, and everything else to fill a cast and crew. They kept their crew extremely small and only had a few cooks in the kitchen so there wasn’t a lot of overhead or delays in making decisions. Most of the film was shot in Greg’s actual apartment. In the middle of the movie, you have to realize almost nothing on the screen is real and all the actors are acting like they were in front of a green screen…without the green screen. If you see this movie, your face will turn into this Avoid this movie. Please, trust me. I really wanted to like it hoping it would be a new step forward in cinema but the outcome was two steps back. It’s really a home movie or college film product that should be kept to the Strause Brother’s friends and not the whole movie watching public. It was a nice attempt to do something fun and new but it didn’t deliver. The bad thing is that this movie won’t be considered a failure because it will most likely make back their money in the first weekend. Remember, it was only made for $10 million and in movie terms, that’s nothing! This was literally a bunch of Hollywood friends who got together and made their own movie on the cheap. They call it the new way of film making, but if Skyline is any indication of the finished product…let’s hope it isn’t. You can read more about the background of how this film was made here in our coverage from Comic-Con. [...] [...] Skyline was laughable. This is a contender to be one of the worst films to be put on the big screen this year. Even though it’s kind of amazing how this movie was made and for how small the budget was, people will expect a big blockbuster movie going into the theater and they will be very disappointed. For a movie that was a social commentary about human society via an outright alien invasion, Skyline was more of a comedy of how poorly written and cliche a movie can be. The movie begins with blue lights falling from the sky. Like a car crash, everyone is captivated by what’s going on and is attracted to the light like bugs to a bug zapper. But you don’t want to look into this light. Instantly, it starts taking control of your body and pulling you towards it. You join a group of beautiful-looking friends in their apartment as they try to figure out what to do. This isn’t your typical alien movie. They don’t hide their monsters at all. Skyline was created by the Brothers Strause (Colin and Greg Strause) who own Hydraulx which is a special effects company which has worked on big studio movies like Iron Man 2, 300, and Avatar. I was actually underwhelmed by the visual effects of the film but with a ten million dollar budget, it was still impressive…we’ll get more into that later. How crazy would it be if you woke up to that one morning… Skyline follows the initial group of friends as they run around their apartment complex trying to run away from the alien hordes. They inevitably run into a never ending supply of characters we don’t care about that can be killed and allow the movie to roll on. The acting is pretty sub par all around the cast except for Donald Faison and Scottie Thompson. The character depth is nonexistent and the only character with cajones is Oliver, the Hispanic concierge. I’m surprised more people didn’t walk out in my screening and I’m sure many people will be throughout the weekend. You can only laugh more at the next scene until the ending which is completely ridiculous and basically sums up the movie. You’ll leave the theater saying, “Really?” Typical slowly dying acting The only good elements of the film I could think of were some quick moving scenes that surprise you. If you’re expecting to be scared and jump out of your seat there may be two or three parts that will get you but you’ll either be laughing before, after, or doing them. There are scenes reminiscent of Independence Day and Cloverfield but Skyline is no where near any of those movie’s levels. The background music is annoying and keeps trying to sound epic and uplifting when anything “positive” happens and then quickly draws back when the characters realize what they thought worked…didn’t. This happens repeatedly throughout the film and really peeved me. Almost everything in this pic was computer generated…amazing The way Skyline was made is incredible in itself. The Strause brothers sat down with their creative friend and decided to make a movie independently on their own without a studio. They owned their own special effects studio (which is the bulk of this film), they had camera and lighting friends, friends to do sound, and everything else to fill a cast and crew. They kept their crew extremely small and only had a few cooks in the kitchen so there wasn’t a lot of overhead or delays in making decisions. Most of the film was shot in Greg’s actual apartment. In the middle of the movie, you have to realize almost nothing on the screen is real and all the actors are acting like they were in front of a green screen…without the green screen. If you see this movie, your face will turn into this Avoid this movie. Please, trust me. I really wanted to like it hoping it would be a new step forward in cinema but the outcome was two steps back. It’s really a home movie or college film product that should be kept to the Strause Brother’s friends and not the whole movie watching public. It was a nice attempt to do something fun and new but it didn’t deliver. The bad thing is that this movie won’t be considered a failure because it will most likely make back their money in the first weekend. Remember, it was only made for $10 million and in movie terms, that’s nothing! This was literally a bunch of Hollywood friends who got together and made their own movie on the cheap. They call it the new way of film making, but if Skyline is any indication of the finished product…let’s hope it isn’t. You can read more about the background of how this film was made here in our coverage from Comic-Con. [...]

]]> http://advancescreenings.com/2010/07/comic-con-preview-skyline/comment-page-1/#comment-315 Kacy Press Thu, 12 Aug 2010 22:13:00 +0000 http://advancescreenings.com/?p=725#comment-315 The official site and teaser trailer of SKYLINE, a sci-fi movie about extraterrestrial trying to take over the human population has launched. http://bit.ly/b9h8YN The official site and teaser trailer of SKYLINE, a sci-fi movie about extraterrestrial trying to take over the human population has launched. http://bit.ly/b9h8YN

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