Directed by:
Rawson Marshall ThurberScreenplay:
Rawson Marshall ThurberCinematography:
Robert ElswitComposer:
Steve JablonskyCast:
Dwayne Johnson, Neve Campbell, Pablo Schreiber, Noah Taylor, Roland Møller, Chin Han, Byron Mann, Hannah Quinlivan, McKenna Roberts, Noah Cottrell (more)VOD (2)
Plots(1)
When his family becomes trapped after terrorists attack the world's tallest building, a security consultant goes to extreme lengths to try and save them. (Netflix)
Videos (9)
Reviews (8)
It's OK. And I didn't expect more than OK. Dwayne Johnson tries it without humour this time and plays on a serious note and he's quite good at it. It's actually just as goofy as most of his films, but similarly flushingly entertaining. In the end, Skyscraper is a lot closer to The Towering Inferno than it is to John McClane's action flicks, but jumping on a giant building, scaling ledges hundreds of feet off the ground, and escaping from a raging fiery inferno certainly doesn't get boring. Rawson Marshall Thurber is a solid craftsman, and he's made sure that there's always something going on in his new release, so you won't have much time to think about how silly the whole thing is and how it doesn't make any sense at all. Too bad about the weak villains and how blatantly unambitious the film is. But as a summer filler between Ant-Man and the Wasp, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and another Mission: Impossible, Skyscraper works just fine.
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Die Hard is history! And Bruce Willis can go bury himself. Dwayne "Super-Super-Super-Ultrahero" Johnson has finally found his magnum opus, and I applaud, moved and teary-eyed, in an empty theatre. A wonderfully entertaining first-rate answer to all the inferior and illogical action crap with the aforementioned Die Hard leading the way. Grandiose and endlessly creative popcorn flick for all who love The Rock and his standard of craftsmanship (so, of course, for everyone). The scene on the crane is the best adrenaline ride in history. Bottom line, an artisanal rip-off of action legends for an inoffensive three stars. Or you don’t get the irony?
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The Rock is trying to save his family in the midst of a fire in the biggest skyscraper in the world, and a group of terrorists are in his way. The movie is much more The Towering Inferno than Die Hard, which bummed me out a bit, but you can never have too many disaster movies. It may be silly, but that jump off the crane scene is one of the best the film has to offer, even at the cost of being very over the top, but it's a movie, so why not. It keeps the pace, there's no shortage of tension, there are a few fights, The Rock has incredible charisma, and visually it's just okay. As a summer blockbuster, it meets the criteria and I enjoyed it. 70%
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While watching this I couldn't stop thinking about the comment from the documentary Electric Boogaloo that even though spent the 80s and 90s shooting virtually the same stories with similar outcomes, the difference was that they were on the fringes of film interest and were making films with minimal budgets only to sell them to distribution companies later, their contemporaries nowadays are blockbusters with the most expensive actors and nine-figure budgets. Infantile times call for infantile deeds. Although engagement in the form of being drowned in something helps, because the dizzying scenes and the occasional destruction here and there can be pleasing to the undemanding eye, it's more likely that irritation will ultimately prevail over the poorly edited action, sleazy pandering to the Chinese market, dull motivations and characters, and Dwayne Johnson's unbearably incompetent acting (don't tell me he didn't indiscreetly feel someone up maybe a decade ago, come on, find the evidence. I'll give you money). Plus, the presence of terrorists in the building brings to mind the first Die Hard every now and then, and as soon as you’ve got that on your mind, the whole Skyscraper comes tumbling down.
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A seamless action flick that I was happy to forgive. In fact, Skyscraper had the same effect on me as some of the (now so-called classic) Schwarzenegger or Stallone movies – they weren't always masterpieces, but those two gentlemen were the reason I enjoyed watching them every time, and the reason I enjoyed those movies. Dwayne Johnson is cut from the same cloth this time around. He's charismatic, tough, you root for him even when you know everything is going to turn out well; you have fun. I especially appreciate that after crap like Jumanji, Rampage, and San Andreas, Johnson is in something that isn't completely goofy or parodic, but that takes itself seriously within the genre of expensive B-movies, and only occasionally lightens things up with humor. Plus, there's the cool idea of the protagonist having a prosthetic leg, which he makes use of a lot, and the crane scene, for example, is so over the top it's excellent (Jablonsky's music stands out during this one, as it does elsewhere as well; though simple and routine, it adds atmosphere). I wasn't expecting much and I am satisfied.
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