Dark Skies Review

• 1st Aug 2013

On initial viewing any given aspect of Dark Skies will remind the viewer of a myriad of other genre horror and science-fiction films. The very opening shots show us a typical suburban American street but the viewer is immediately reminded of the pastoral American suburbia that opens Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984); in fact these opening shots could have been directly lifted from that film. But there is something ominous afoot in this suburban setting. The film will focus, almost exclusively focus on the Barrett family, a family who like many are feeling the pressure of the modern world with the proud father seeking a job since being let go from his previous employer with mortgage payments outstanding and a teenage son learning to grow up. The couple also have another younger son. The family unit and the naturalistic way the family is filmed have other similar reminders in Tobe Hooper’s classic Poltergeist (1982). Soon some strange and bizarre things begin to happen to the family which build as the film develops. It starts with food from the fridge appearing all over the floor one morning. The initial reaction is that it is an animal intruder; objects being carefully balanced around the family home and family photos disappear out of their frames. The Barrett’s set up a burglar alarm system but when it becomes activated it goes off all over the house but there is no sign of any intrusion. Is it a fault? Or are these things all connected? The wife, Lacy (played by TV show ‘The Americans’ Keri Russell) finally thinks that it is something other worldly (in one of the best shock moments of the film) when hundreds of starlings and other birds fly in a suicidal death wish into the house (Hitchcock’s The Birds) and each of them seem to be possessed. Doing research she believes all these events lead to the household being observed by an extra terrestrial. Initially husband Daniel (Josh Hamilton) is sceptical but when they begin to see strange shapes in the house (‘greys’) and members of the family go into strange zombie like states he comes round to her way of thinking.

Director Scott Stewart had previously made Legion (2009) and has teamed together with another horror genre specialist, Jason Blum, the man behind such recent horror hits as Paranormal Activity (2009), Insidious (2011) and Sinister (2012) and the result is a very effective piece of home invasion horror/sci-fi that one would expect from this teaming. The problem with Dark Skies is that its references are not subtle enough making the film rather workmanlike despite its best efforts. It builds the tension really well throughout though and the shock moments, while at times clichéd do come fast and furious and are for the most part effective. It was wise to not build too many peripheral characters in, only an irritating oik who is best friend’s with the elder son (and whom the father calls ‘ratface’) and an alien specialist (played by J.K. Simmons in a cameo appearance) keeping the focus solely on the family and their sense of isolation and eventual alienation from the community – perhaps a sense of alienation that anyone out of work sometimes feels in a middle-class suburban community. The climactic scenes are perhaps a little heavy handed – but so too were those in Poltergeist. The difference is that Hooper’s film was an original film and Stewart’s is not. Never the less what he has done, he has done very well. Undoubtedly we can expect a sequel which will have even more of a sense of familiarity about it.

The extras on the disc include a commentary by the films director and screenwriter, Scott Stewart, producer Blum plus other members of the production team as well as a series of alternate takes and deleted scenes.

Chris Hick