Skyline (2010 film)
Encyclopedia
Skyline is a 2010 alien invasion
science fiction film
directed and produced by the Brothers Strause
. The film was released on November 12, 2010. It stars Eric Balfour
, Scottie Thompson
, Donald Faison
, and David Zayas
. The Brothers Strause asserted before the film's release that Skyline would be the first film in a series, which would include at least one other film.
), an artist, and his girlfriend Elaine (Scottie Thompson
) have flown to Los Angeles
for Jarrod's best friend Terry's (Donald Faison
) birthday party. They spend the night celebrating with Terry's girlfriend, Candice (Brittany Daniel
), and his assistant, Denise (Crystal Reed
). During the party, one of Terry's employees, Ray (Neil Hopkins
), welcomes Jarrod to L.A., thinking he has moved there to join Terry's special effects company. During a private argument about whether or not they should move to L.A., Elaine reveals that she is pregnant.
Early the next morning, bright blue lights descend from the sky, entrancing anyone who looks at them. The light turns their eyes milky white and makes blood vessels stand out on the skin. Captive in the light, immobilized humans are taken up by the machines. Ray suffers this fate, but Jarrod is saved when Terry tackles him. Jarrod returns to normal shortly after. He and Terry decide to investigate the light from the roof of the highrise, where they see several alien ships descend over the blue lights and vacuum up thousands of entranced people. Locked out on the roof, they are almost captured by flying machines, but Elaine opens the door from inside. She is temporarily mesmerized, but Jarrod saves her.
Back in the apartment Jarrod argues that open water would be a safer place than Terry's condo since there are no machines over the sea, so they attempt to reach the marina by car, splitting into two groups: Terry and Denise in one car, Candice, Jarrod, and Elaine in the other. On the way out they meet an arguing couple, Colin (J. Paul Boehmer
) and Jen (Tanya Newbould), also attempting to flee the building. Terry's car is the first to leave, but is stomped flat in the exit by a massive walking lifeform. Denise is killed, but Terry escapes. As he attempts to flee into the garage, he is abducted. The survivors flee into the garage where they encounter a squid-like lifeform and it takes Colin. It corners the rest of the group, then suddenly the building's concierge, Oliver (David Zayas
), slams into it with an SUV. Colin is still alive inside the 'squid.' As Jen and Oliver attempt to free him, the machine comes to life again, sucks out Colin's brain, and inserts the organ into its head, regaining back its energy. As the five flee back into the building, Jen is quickly abducted.
The next day, the United States Air Force launches an attack on the spaceships using X-47B
with a fighter screen of MQ-9 Reaper
aircraft armed with AGM-114 Hellfire
missiles. Only one X-47B gets through, and shoots an AGM-129A
missile with a W80-1 nuclear warhead at the mothership just as it is destroyed. The detonation rips the ship apart and it falls, but as the mushroom cloud later clears it then slowly begins to repair itself. After telling only Elaine that the mesmerizing light made him feel powerful and that he still has that power, Jarrod becomes adamant that safety must be found outside. Oliver wants to stay in and tries to restrain him. Jarrod's eyes turn milky and his veins start to show again: he lifts Oliver off the floor one-handed. He vows that no one will stop him from protecting his family.
Military helicopters come in and insert squads of soldiers in multicam uniforms. Jarrod and Elaine goes to the roof hoping to ride a helicopter to safety. Oliver and Candice still hide in the penthouse, but they are found. Candice accidentally exposes herself to the blue light and is absorbed; Oliver sacrifices himself and attempts to kill an alien by turning on a gas stove and igniting a lighter, causing the room to explode along with Oliver and the alien. (It is later revealed that the alien was simply burnt badly but not dead). The army is thrown off the roof by the aliens and one of the squid-like alien lifeforms attacks Jarrod and Elaine. Together, they kill it, but with Jarrod badly hurt, both are hopelessly trapped when the aliens have defeated the military and begin approaching them. Resigned to their fate, they look up into the blue light, embrace and are sucked up.
A brief montage shows that cities such as New York City, London, Hong Kong, and Las Vegas have all been attacked and the aliens appear to have won. Inside the alien spacecraft, Elaine wakes up in an eerie blue gloom on a gory pile of lifeless human bodies. Tubes are sucking human brains into machine husks with humanoid exterior, animating them; probes go through the pile looking for what they can find. Elaine sees Jarrod in the pile but has to watch helplessly as his brain is removed from his head. She herself is spared when a probe finds that she is pregnant. Elaine is transported to another chamber where all the pregnant human women are being sent and Jarrod's brain, glowing red in all of the blue, is inserted into a humanoid.
Animating the alien body, Jarrod seems to retain control, and comes to the aid of Elaine and their unborn child. The movie ends with a series of still images between the credits that depict "Jarrod" protecting Elaine and their child from other aliens. Eventually "Jarrod" defeats them, picks his girlfriend up, and runs off with her.
The physical production only cost $500,000. With all the visual effects the total budget was around $10–20 million.
On November 11, 2010, producer Brett Ratner
said on the Opie and Anthony Show that the film cost $10 million to make. The Brothers Strause insist that they will film a sequel
with their own money and try to find a distributor to release it.
was contemplating legal action against Greg and Colin Strause, the directors of Skyline and the owners of Hydraulx Filmz. Sony paid Hydraulx to generate visual effects work for Battle: Los Angeles
. But Hydraulx never informed Sony the siblings were directing a rival alien invasion feature, similarly driven by special effects, scheduled for release four months prior to Sony's feature. A rep for the Strauses issued a statement: "Any claims of impropriety are completely baseless. This is a blatant attempt by Sony to force these independent filmmakers to move a release date that has long been set by Universal and Relativity and is outside the filmmakers' control".
On March 17, Sony released a statement dismissing its arbitration against Hydraulx and the Strause Brothers citing that after the discovery phase they were satisfied that none of the Battle: Los Angeles visual effects were used in Skyline. The Strause Brothers stated, “We’re glad to put this behind us. We’ve been honored to work on several wonderful SPE projects in the past and look forward to future collaborations.”
, who served as one of the film's executive producers.
. Following the theatrical release, the movie will run on Netflix
. A trailer was released August 13 and attached to Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
and Devil
. The second trailer was released on September 29 and then attached to My Soul to Take
on October 15. Another trailer was also attached to Paranormal Activity 2
. The trailer has also been attached to Red
and Jackass 3D
in the United Kingdom and Canada.
gives the film a score of 15% based on 67 reviews, with an average score of 3.5/10. Similarly, Metacritic
rated the film with a score of 26 out of 100, based on 18 critics. Writing in Variety
, Joe Leydon panned the film: "Imagine a Kmart mash-up of Transformers and Independence Day
and you're appropriately primed for Skyline, an underwhelming and derivative sci-fi thriller that's only marginally more impressive than a run-of-the-mill SyFy Channel telepic." Michael Philips
of the Chicago Tribune
wrote that the "effects are pretty good, on a fairly limited budget. And that's about all you can say for Skyline." Screen Rant's Ben Kendrick wrote that the film "comes across as a big-screen B-movie with a convoluted plot and too limited of a scope to make the audience feel the worldwide alien-apocalypse that’s supposedly unfolding in the film". In the New York Times, Mike Hale concluded, "it turns out that all the running and hiding and chopping (there’s an axe) was beside the point, which is the sort of thing that can make you angry if you care about the characters, but in this case is kind of a relief."
However, there were positive reviews, including Matthew Sorrento's at Film Threat, who commented, "Skyline, if not always successful, refashions the modern alien invasion motif as the hopeless siege that it should be." Kim Newman from Empire Magazine also endorsed the film, writing, "... delivers all the Saturday night whiz-bang and Sunday morning brain-ripping you could want." Perhaps most positive was The Suns Alex Zane, who exclaimed, "while it starts out as just a Cloverfield
/Independence Day
pastiche, this turns into something almost brilliant."
, and Due Date
. As of December 11 the film had made $21,393,620 in the United States and $43,677,358 internationally for a worldwide total of $73,950,941.
Alien invasion
The alien invasion is a common theme in science fiction stories and film, in which extraterrestrial life invades Earth either to exterminate and supplant human life, enslave it under a colonial system, harvest humans for food, steal the planet's resources, or destroy the planet altogether.The...
science fiction film
Science fiction film
Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...
directed and produced by the Brothers Strause
Brothers Strause
Brothers Greg and Colin Strause are a directing duo, most famous for directing Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem and Skyline, and special effects artists who make movies and grew up in Waukegan, Illinois...
. The film was released on November 12, 2010. It stars Eric Balfour
Eric Balfour
Eric Salter Balfour is an American singer and actor of film and television. He is the lead singer of Born As Ghosts, formerly known as Fredalba...
, Scottie Thompson
Scottie Thompson
Susan Scott "Scottie" Thompson is an American film, television and stage actress.-Early life:Thompson grew up in Richmond, Virginia, where she attended Collegiate School. From an early age she began learning ballet, jazz and modern dance...
, Donald Faison
Donald Faison
Donald Adeosun Faison is an American actor, comedian, and voice actor best known for his role as Dr. Chris Turk in the ABC comedy-drama Scrubs and as Murray in the film Clueless and the subsequent television series of the same name.Faison has also co-starred in the films Remember the Titans ,...
, and David Zayas
David Zayas
David Zayas is a Puerto Rican theatrical, film, and television actor. He is most known for his roles as Angel Batista on Showtime's series Dexter and as Enrique Morales on the HBO prison drama Oz.- Life and career :...
. The Brothers Strause asserted before the film's release that Skyline would be the first film in a series, which would include at least one other film.
Plot
Jarrod (Eric BalfourEric Balfour
Eric Salter Balfour is an American singer and actor of film and television. He is the lead singer of Born As Ghosts, formerly known as Fredalba...
), an artist, and his girlfriend Elaine (Scottie Thompson
Scottie Thompson
Susan Scott "Scottie" Thompson is an American film, television and stage actress.-Early life:Thompson grew up in Richmond, Virginia, where she attended Collegiate School. From an early age she began learning ballet, jazz and modern dance...
) have flown to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
for Jarrod's best friend Terry's (Donald Faison
Donald Faison
Donald Adeosun Faison is an American actor, comedian, and voice actor best known for his role as Dr. Chris Turk in the ABC comedy-drama Scrubs and as Murray in the film Clueless and the subsequent television series of the same name.Faison has also co-starred in the films Remember the Titans ,...
) birthday party. They spend the night celebrating with Terry's girlfriend, Candice (Brittany Daniel
Brittany Daniel
Brittany Ann Daniel is an American television and film actress. She is the twin sister of actress and photographer Cynthia Daniel...
), and his assistant, Denise (Crystal Reed
Crystal Reed
Crystal Reed is an American actress. She is perhaps best known for her role as Denise in the feature film Skyline and as Allison Argent in the MTV series Teen Wolf.-Life and career:...
). During the party, one of Terry's employees, Ray (Neil Hopkins
Neil Hopkins
Neil Edward Hopkins is an American television and film actor. He is a trained actor and singer; best known for his portrayal of Charlie's heroin-addicted brother Liam on Lost.-Early life:Hopkins was born in Trenton, New Jersey...
), welcomes Jarrod to L.A., thinking he has moved there to join Terry's special effects company. During a private argument about whether or not they should move to L.A., Elaine reveals that she is pregnant.
Early the next morning, bright blue lights descend from the sky, entrancing anyone who looks at them. The light turns their eyes milky white and makes blood vessels stand out on the skin. Captive in the light, immobilized humans are taken up by the machines. Ray suffers this fate, but Jarrod is saved when Terry tackles him. Jarrod returns to normal shortly after. He and Terry decide to investigate the light from the roof of the highrise, where they see several alien ships descend over the blue lights and vacuum up thousands of entranced people. Locked out on the roof, they are almost captured by flying machines, but Elaine opens the door from inside. She is temporarily mesmerized, but Jarrod saves her.
Back in the apartment Jarrod argues that open water would be a safer place than Terry's condo since there are no machines over the sea, so they attempt to reach the marina by car, splitting into two groups: Terry and Denise in one car, Candice, Jarrod, and Elaine in the other. On the way out they meet an arguing couple, Colin (J. Paul Boehmer
J. Paul Boehmer
J. Paul Boehmer is an American actor best known for his numerous appearances in the Star Trek universe. He appeared in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise as well as video games Star Trek: Klingon Academy and Star Trek: Bridge Commander...
) and Jen (Tanya Newbould), also attempting to flee the building. Terry's car is the first to leave, but is stomped flat in the exit by a massive walking lifeform. Denise is killed, but Terry escapes. As he attempts to flee into the garage, he is abducted. The survivors flee into the garage where they encounter a squid-like lifeform and it takes Colin. It corners the rest of the group, then suddenly the building's concierge, Oliver (David Zayas
David Zayas
David Zayas is a Puerto Rican theatrical, film, and television actor. He is most known for his roles as Angel Batista on Showtime's series Dexter and as Enrique Morales on the HBO prison drama Oz.- Life and career :...
), slams into it with an SUV. Colin is still alive inside the 'squid.' As Jen and Oliver attempt to free him, the machine comes to life again, sucks out Colin's brain, and inserts the organ into its head, regaining back its energy. As the five flee back into the building, Jen is quickly abducted.
The next day, the United States Air Force launches an attack on the spaceships using X-47B
Northrop Grumman X-47B
|-See also:-External links:* and * * * * - TFOT magazine**...
with a fighter screen of MQ-9 Reaper
MQ-9 Reaper
The General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper is an unmanned aerial vehicle , capable of remote controlled or autonomous flight operations, developed by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems for use by the United States Air Force, the United States Navy, the CIA, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Royal...
aircraft armed with AGM-114 Hellfire
AGM-114 Hellfire
The AGM-114 Hellfire is an air-to-surface missile developed primarily for anti-armor use. It has multi-mission, multi-target precision-strike capability, and can be launched from multiple air, sea, and ground platforms. The Hellfire missile is the primary 100 lb-class air-to-ground precision...
missiles. Only one X-47B gets through, and shoots an AGM-129A
AGM-129 ACM
* Missile of the same class** Ra'ad ** TAURUS KEPD 350 ** Storm Shadow -Notes:# Alleged violations of the Antideficiency Act in the Air Force’s procurement of advanced cruise missiles.FILE B-255831, Office of the General Counsel, United States General Accounting Office.# Union Calls for Strike by...
missile with a W80-1 nuclear warhead at the mothership just as it is destroyed. The detonation rips the ship apart and it falls, but as the mushroom cloud later clears it then slowly begins to repair itself. After telling only Elaine that the mesmerizing light made him feel powerful and that he still has that power, Jarrod becomes adamant that safety must be found outside. Oliver wants to stay in and tries to restrain him. Jarrod's eyes turn milky and his veins start to show again: he lifts Oliver off the floor one-handed. He vows that no one will stop him from protecting his family.
Military helicopters come in and insert squads of soldiers in multicam uniforms. Jarrod and Elaine goes to the roof hoping to ride a helicopter to safety. Oliver and Candice still hide in the penthouse, but they are found. Candice accidentally exposes herself to the blue light and is absorbed; Oliver sacrifices himself and attempts to kill an alien by turning on a gas stove and igniting a lighter, causing the room to explode along with Oliver and the alien. (It is later revealed that the alien was simply burnt badly but not dead). The army is thrown off the roof by the aliens and one of the squid-like alien lifeforms attacks Jarrod and Elaine. Together, they kill it, but with Jarrod badly hurt, both are hopelessly trapped when the aliens have defeated the military and begin approaching them. Resigned to their fate, they look up into the blue light, embrace and are sucked up.
A brief montage shows that cities such as New York City, London, Hong Kong, and Las Vegas have all been attacked and the aliens appear to have won. Inside the alien spacecraft, Elaine wakes up in an eerie blue gloom on a gory pile of lifeless human bodies. Tubes are sucking human brains into machine husks with humanoid exterior, animating them; probes go through the pile looking for what they can find. Elaine sees Jarrod in the pile but has to watch helplessly as his brain is removed from his head. She herself is spared when a probe finds that she is pregnant. Elaine is transported to another chamber where all the pregnant human women are being sent and Jarrod's brain, glowing red in all of the blue, is inserted into a humanoid.
Animating the alien body, Jarrod seems to retain control, and comes to the aid of Elaine and their unborn child. The movie ends with a series of still images between the credits that depict "Jarrod" protecting Elaine and their child from other aliens. Eventually "Jarrod" defeats them, picks his girlfriend up, and runs off with her.
Cast
- Eric BalfourEric BalfourEric Salter Balfour is an American singer and actor of film and television. He is the lead singer of Born As Ghosts, formerly known as Fredalba...
as Jarrod - Scottie ThompsonScottie ThompsonSusan Scott "Scottie" Thompson is an American film, television and stage actress.-Early life:Thompson grew up in Richmond, Virginia, where she attended Collegiate School. From an early age she began learning ballet, jazz and modern dance...
as Elaine - Brittany DanielBrittany DanielBrittany Ann Daniel is an American television and film actress. She is the twin sister of actress and photographer Cynthia Daniel...
as Candice - Crystal ReedCrystal ReedCrystal Reed is an American actress. She is perhaps best known for her role as Denise in the feature film Skyline and as Allison Argent in the MTV series Teen Wolf.-Life and career:...
as Denise - Neil HopkinsNeil HopkinsNeil Edward Hopkins is an American television and film actor. He is a trained actor and singer; best known for his portrayal of Charlie's heroin-addicted brother Liam on Lost.-Early life:Hopkins was born in Trenton, New Jersey...
as Ray - David ZayasDavid ZayasDavid Zayas is a Puerto Rican theatrical, film, and television actor. He is most known for his roles as Angel Batista on Showtime's series Dexter and as Enrique Morales on the HBO prison drama Oz.- Life and career :...
as Oliver - Donald FaisonDonald FaisonDonald Adeosun Faison is an American actor, comedian, and voice actor best known for his role as Dr. Chris Turk in the ABC comedy-drama Scrubs and as Murray in the film Clueless and the subsequent television series of the same name.Faison has also co-starred in the films Remember the Titans ,...
as Terry - Tanya Newbould as Jen
- J. Paul BoehmerJ. Paul BoehmerJ. Paul Boehmer is an American actor best known for his numerous appearances in the Star Trek universe. He appeared in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise as well as video games Star Trek: Klingon Academy and Star Trek: Bridge Commander...
as Colin
Production
The project began filming in Marina Del Rey in February 2010 through March 31. Most of the action was shot in the high-rise condo in which Greg Strause lives.The physical production only cost $500,000. With all the visual effects the total budget was around $10–20 million.
On November 11, 2010, producer Brett Ratner
Brett Ratner
Brett Ratner is an American film director, film producer and music video director. He is best known for directing the Rush Hour film series, The Family Man, Red Dragon, X-Men: The Last Stand, and Tower Heist. He was also a producer on the Fox drama series, Prison Break.- Early life :Ratner was...
said on the Opie and Anthony Show that the film cost $10 million to make. The Brothers Strause insist that they will film a sequel
Sequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...
with their own money and try to find a distributor to release it.
Legal action from Sony
In August 2010 it was reported that Sony Pictures EntertainmentSony Pictures Entertainment
Sony Pictures Entertainment, Inc. is the television and film production/distribution unit of Japanese multinational technology and media conglomerate Sony...
was contemplating legal action against Greg and Colin Strause, the directors of Skyline and the owners of Hydraulx Filmz. Sony paid Hydraulx to generate visual effects work for Battle: Los Angeles
Battle: Los Angeles
Battle: Los Angeles is a 2011 American military science fiction war film directed by Jonathan Liebesman, and starring Aaron Eckhart, Michelle Rodriguez, Ramon Rodriguez, Bridget Moynahan, Ne-Yo and Michael Peña...
. But Hydraulx never informed Sony the siblings were directing a rival alien invasion feature, similarly driven by special effects, scheduled for release four months prior to Sony's feature. A rep for the Strauses issued a statement: "Any claims of impropriety are completely baseless. This is a blatant attempt by Sony to force these independent filmmakers to move a release date that has long been set by Universal and Relativity and is outside the filmmakers' control".
On March 17, Sony released a statement dismissing its arbitration against Hydraulx and the Strause Brothers citing that after the discovery phase they were satisfied that none of the Battle: Los Angeles visual effects were used in Skyline. The Strause Brothers stated, “We’re glad to put this behind us. We’ve been honored to work on several wonderful SPE projects in the past and look forward to future collaborations.”
Music
Composer Matthew Margeson is a colleague of Brian TylerBrian Tyler
Brian Tyler is an American auto racing driver.He was a back-to-back USAC National Sprint car Champion for Larry Contos Racing in 1996 and 1997. He made 10 starts in the Indy Racing League IndyCar Series in 1998 and 1999 for 3 different teams with a best finish of 6th at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway...
, who served as one of the film's executive producers.
Track listing
Release
The film was released on November 12, 2010 in North America and November 11 in Australia, and is distributed by Universal PicturesUniversal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
. Following the theatrical release, the movie will run on Netflix
Netflix
Netflix, Inc., is an American provider of on-demand internet streaming media in the United States, Canada, and Latin America and flat rate DVD-by-mail in the United States. The company was established in 1997 and is headquartered in Los Gatos, California...
. A trailer was released August 13 and attached to Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a 2010 comedy film directed by Edgar Wright, based on the graphic novel series Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O'Malley. The film is about Scott Pilgrim , a young Canadian musician, meeting the girl of his dreams, Ramona Flowers , an American delivery girl...
and Devil
Devil (film)
Devil is a 2010 American supernatural horror film directed by John Erick Dowdle and written by Brian Nelson based on a story by M. Night Shyamalan. The film stars Chris Messina, Bojana Novakovic, Bokeem Woodbine, Logan Marshall-Green, Jenny O'Hara and Geoffrey Arend...
. The second trailer was released on September 29 and then attached to My Soul to Take
My Soul to Take
My Soul to Take is a 2010 American horror film, written and directed by Wes Craven. It is his first film since 1994's Wes Craven's New Nightmare that he both wrote and directed.The film stars Max Thieriot as the protagonist Adam "Bug" Hellerman, who is one of seven teenagers chosen to die.The film...
on October 15. Another trailer was also attached to Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2
Paranormal Activity 2 is a 2010 American supernatural horror film directed by Tod Williams and written by Michael R. Perry. The film is a parallel prequel to the 2007 film Paranormal Activity, beginning two months before and following up with the events depicted in the original film...
. The trailer has also been attached to Red
Red (2010 film)
RED is a 2010 American action comedy film loosely inspired by the three-issue comic book series of the same name created by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner, and published by the DC Comics imprint Homage...
and Jackass 3D
Jackass 3D
Jackass 3D is a 2010 American 3D comedy film and the fourth film in the Jackass series. It was released on October 15, 2010 by Paramount Pictures and MTV Films to American theaters and marked the 10th anniversary of the franchise, which started in 2000...
in the United Kingdom and Canada.
Critical response
Skyline was not screened to critics prior to its release in the United States, and the reviews upon its release were largely negative. Review aggregation website Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
gives the film a score of 15% based on 67 reviews, with an average score of 3.5/10. Similarly, Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
rated the film with a score of 26 out of 100, based on 18 critics. Writing in Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
, Joe Leydon panned the film: "Imagine a Kmart mash-up of Transformers and Independence Day
Independence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
and you're appropriately primed for Skyline, an underwhelming and derivative sci-fi thriller that's only marginally more impressive than a run-of-the-mill SyFy Channel telepic." Michael Philips
Michael Phillips (critic)
Michael Phillips is a film critic for the Chicago Tribune newspaper. Previously he was the drama critic of the Tribune; the Los Angeles Times; the St. Paul Pioneer Press; the San Diego Union-Tribune; and the Dallas Times Herald....
of the Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
wrote that the "effects are pretty good, on a fairly limited budget. And that's about all you can say for Skyline." Screen Rant's Ben Kendrick wrote that the film "comes across as a big-screen B-movie with a convoluted plot and too limited of a scope to make the audience feel the worldwide alien-apocalypse that’s supposedly unfolding in the film". In the New York Times, Mike Hale concluded, "it turns out that all the running and hiding and chopping (there’s an axe) was beside the point, which is the sort of thing that can make you angry if you care about the characters, but in this case is kind of a relief."
However, there were positive reviews, including Matthew Sorrento's at Film Threat, who commented, "Skyline, if not always successful, refashions the modern alien invasion motif as the hopeless siege that it should be." Kim Newman from Empire Magazine also endorsed the film, writing, "... delivers all the Saturday night whiz-bang and Sunday morning brain-ripping you could want." Perhaps most positive was The Suns Alex Zane, who exclaimed, "while it starts out as just a Cloverfield
Cloverfield
Cloverfield is a 2008 American disaster-monster film directed by Matt Reeves, produced by J. J. Abrams and written by Drew Goddard.The film follows six young New Yorkers attending a going-away party on the night that a gigantic monster attacks the city...
/Independence Day
Independence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
pastiche, this turns into something almost brilliant."
Box office
Skyline opened on November 12, 2010 and grossed $4,752,000 on that opening day. By November 14, the film had grossed $11,678,000 and had made number four for the weekend, behind Megaminds second #1 opening, UnstoppableUnstoppable (2010 film)
Unstoppable is a 2010 American action thriller film directed by Tony Scott, written by Mark Bomback, and starring Denzel Washington and Chris Pine. The film tells the story of a runaway freight train, and the two men who attempt to stop it.The film was released in the United States and Canada on...
, and Due Date
Due Date
Due Date is a 2010 American comedy road film directed by Todd Phillips, co-written by Alan R. Cohen, Alan Freedland, and Adam Sztykiel, and starring Robert Downey, Jr. and Zach Galifianakis. The film was released on November 5, 2010...
. As of December 11 the film had made $21,393,620 in the United States and $43,677,358 internationally for a worldwide total of $73,950,941.