Here He comes to save the day! (Sky Captain & World Of Tomorrow (DVD))

Name: Ailran

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Product:	Sky Captain & World Of Tomorrow (DVD)
Date:	01.05.07 (163 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great fun, looks incredible, loads of in jokes

Disadvantages: Paltrow out of place, special effects a bit heavy at times

I have to start by acknowledging the fact that I had a big bias going into ‘Sky Captain’. I love the old 1930’s pulps of Doc Savage and The Shadow (two awful films that don’t do their literary predecessors justice), I love the crime based radio shows and adore the old Republic movie serials (Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers et al) of the same period. I reckon I was born way too late!
Having established that I can tell you that I found Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow to be a cracking good yarn. Kerry Conran, the writer/director, took a long time to get Sky Captain of the ground and he obviously feels the same about the serials as I do. Sky Captain not only looks like a 30’s serial but feels like one to. It has the same grand ideas, the crazy, hidden villain, the old style camaraderie between characters and even has the standard catalyst of scientists in trouble getting the hero involved.
Added to that it has the strong damsel who is almost as much trouble as she is help, a good supply of superheroic action and a mysteriously hidden base, all familiar staples from the 30’s.

The plot revolves around Dr. Totenkopf (played by holograms of Laurence Olivier), a secretive German scientist who is gradually killing off other scientists who worked with him. Polly (Gwyneth Platrow) and Sky Captain (Jude Law) discover what is going on and try to stop him, travelling to various locations across the world trying to track him down. That is the basic plot, slight I know but still not as much as the root sources.

The story is very like a serial in its cohesiveness as well. Each section of the movie is like a serial, a bit of story to advance the overall plot leading into the action and derring do. Sky Captain is a throwback to good old-fashioned fun adventure films. Back before violence and swearing infiltrated even family films. It is the ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, the ‘Big Trouble in Little China’ for this generation. Even the music is very reminiscent of Indiana Jones, with the orchestral dramatic sound that plays in the background reminding me of it on occasions.

What sets Sky Captain apart though is the use of CGI. Everything except the actors and what they are actually holding is created by CGI, the backgrounds, the sets, the objects and every robot, vehicle etc. Now I hate the overuse of CGI, especially when it replaces very easy stunts (see Van Helsing & Catwoman), but by making everything except the actors CGI it works, most of the time. The New York of 1930’s is an art deco masterpiece and the mines in Tibet look suitably nightmarish.

Conrans love of films and nostalgia shows up often in little touches and in jokes that keep cropping up. The report in the Japanese newspaper has a photo of Godzilla fighting Totenkopfs robots, the sound of the rays emanating from the giant robots as they attack New York’s generators is (I am sure) that of the Martian ray guns fro the War of The Worlds (1953), the ray gun ???? (Giovanni Ribisi) creates is very similar to Buck Rogers from the old serial and a large cyclopean robot in the warehouse is from Miyasaki’s animated steampunk like ‘Laputo’ (Castle in the Sky as it is now known). I’m sure there were many others that I missed or just didn’t know!

More than that though there is a childhood reminiscing feel to Sky Captain. That awe and wonder that hits you all the time when you are a kid. When you are young you go around seeing things that astound you and fill you with a sense of wonder just because you haven’t seen anything like it before and this is how I felt watching Sky Captain. I was filled with that feeling of being a child seeing the 40’s serials for the first time (and I saw then on BBC2 during the summer not in the cinemas, I’m not that old!) and getting caught up in Sky Captains fantastical futuristic world.

While the CGI is the star if the film it does need to have talented actors and actresses to make it work. It cannot be easy acting when there is absolutely nothing around you to work with. Fortunately Conran has recruited some of the best around. Jude Law shows again that he is a true star on the rise. His performance as Sky Captain is near perfect. He blends the action adventure hero of the time with the wisecracking heroes of today, he looks just like you imagine an aviator hero of the day would look and has the right level of vulnerability.
Gwyneth Paltrow is someone I don’t have much time for. I just don’t like her acting and while she occasionally did seem to have problems with acting to nothing she was quite good in this.
The two star turns acting wise though were from the underrated Giovanni Ribisi (Gone in 60 Seconds, Mod Squad) as Sky Captains techie sidekick, a version of James Bond’s Q, and Angelina Jolie as Frankie, the English friend of Sky Captain who helps the duo out and adds a bit of a romantic triangle to the story.

Now what chance is there of ‘Lost Skeleton of Cadavera’ making it out over here?

Summary: Great fun, a throwback to the old serials of the 40's