SKY CAPTAIN
and the World of Tomorrow
(Reviewed on 09/22/2004)
Sky Captain ROSSMAN
I'm going say this right from the beginning, unapologetically and truthfully: I believe that Sky Captain is the coolest movie since Raiders of the Lost Ark. Fuck you, naysayers! It's the kind of flick that reminds you of how FUN movies can be when they want to be. It's the type of theatrical experience with which you NEED to buy a tub of popcorn and a large Coke in order to fully enjoy it. As one movie critic much wiser than I has already said, "If you don't like Sky Captain, you just don't like movies." Preach on, critic who's name I'm too lazy to look up. I couldn't agree more.
The STYLE and FEEL of Sky Captain is (are?) just perfect! Sky Captain is the GIANT ROBO of Hollywood Motion Pictures. Sky Captain captures the complete and total retro feel of a long lost and classic era (in this case 1930s sci-fi and adventure films) perfectly, from the larger than life (computer) painted backgrounds, and the over the top action sequences to the geek-pants-jizzingly uber sound effects and "Holy shit I gotta buy that!" musical score. It feels like it truly was made in the 1930s. Not just because of the setting, but because of how camera shots are set up, the way the script flows, the delivery of lines, the sense of innocence, wonder and urgency (there's a cliffhanger-like scene every 10-15 minutes in which you expect the film to pause and a narrator to start spouting lines like, "Will Polly and Sky Captain get out their deadly tomb of ice alive?! How will they avoid a frenzied, frozen death in the wilds of Tibet?! Come back next week to find out if.... There truly is a World of Tomorrow!")... It all adds up into one retro-epic adventure that hasn't been seen or felt since The Empire Strikes Back and the previously mentioned Raiders. I kind of wish that I was born back in the 20s (so that I could experience all of the original Sci-Fi and Western serials of the 30s and 40s first hand and enjoy the shit out of them while still an uncorrupted youth), but then I think that it really would have sucked if I had, mostly cause I'd probably already be dead by now (either from the Great Depression, WWII or Carter's presidency). But Sky Captain is a pretty damn good alternative (plus way back then they didn't have internet pr0n or Playboy... How did those poor youths survive past puberty?).
Before I go any further I want to take a look at some complaints I've heard from people about this film (people who haven't even SEEN it yet mind you), namely the fact that they refer to it as "Sky Captain and the Blue Screen of the Future". Yes, everything other than the characters is pretty much CGI in this movie. That's kind of the whole point of it. As opposed to having everything real except the occasional giant robot or plane chase sequence (in which the CGI would probably pop out against the "real world" background plates just as much as they do in Lucas' should-have-been-aborted revamps of his Classic Star Wars Trilogy, and his really sucky new Trilogy of Prequels and everything to do with Jar-Jar "Meesa faggy frogman" Binks), everything blends in together into one seamless world. Would you complain about the usage of computer graphics in Toy Story? No, because everything is CG in that! It's the same thing with Sky Captain. It's not meant to be a "live action" adventure movie, asshats! It's supposed to be a living comic book in the same vein as the classic Flash Gordon or Buck Rogers serials... or even the early Superman shorts! Where the skyscrapers rise up impossibly high, the planes fly forever on one tank of gas, and the waves of evil, flying robots never stop attacking. If you fuckers can't even get that through your mongoloid skulls then just... Oh just forget it. This soon to be classic piece of entertainment would just be wasted on you anyway. Don't read anymore of this review. You suck. Just go away.
Aaaaaaaanyway, Sky Captain is all about Joe "Sky Captain" Sullivan (Jude Law) and his free lance mercenary army (including the always great Giovanni Ribisi) who travel the world saving innocents and stuff. In this episode Joe gets caught up in a plot in which a bunch of foreign accented scientists are kidnapped, a couple hundred giant robots shoot up New York City, and a mysterious, cloaked Asian chick kicks a lot of ass... Mainly Joe's own. But fear not, true believers, for Joe has a lot of good people on his side to help him unkidnap the scientists, get the robots to unattack New York, and stop the hot Asian chick from kicking his ass. First of all there's Polly Perkins (Gwyneth Paltrow), a sort of Veronica Lake (God she was so hot in I Married a Witch!) meets Lois Lane. She's gorgeous, hot and sultry-hot, and she doesn't give up her story leads for anything. Next there's Dex Dearborn, Giovanni's character. Dex is a supergenius. He can invent laser guns, submarine planes, and hovering aircraft carriers. He's like a cool version of Fushigi no Umi no Nadia's Jean. And last (but most definitely not least with her hot ass and puffy lips) on Joe's side is Captain "Franky" Cook, as played by Angelina Jolie with a sexy eyepatch... If she wasn't so mentally fucked up in real life I'd think of her a lot more often when I wack off. But I digress. The cast is perfect. Even Sir Laurence Olivier as Dr. Totenkopf was brilliant, and he died over a decade ago!
Besides the actors and the effects, another part of Sky Captain that is spot-on-perfect is the music and the sound effects. Both taken straight out of The Moon People Attack-type matinees from yesteryear. The music is all most triumphant and trumpety when Sky Captain does something heroic, all sweeping and lovey-dovey when Polly and Joe start making google-eyes at eachother, and all fast tempo and heavy drums when robots and shit attack. And the sound effects! WOW! They're straight out of the classic Fleischer Superman toons! The lasers don't sound like Star Wars blasters at all, they sound all warbly and electric. Brilliant! Everything about this movie is brilliant!!! I am shitting my pants in anticipation of watching it on the big screen in a crowded theater again! Daddy needs his medicine!
Sky Captain is fun, fun, fun. If you want overacted dramatic shlock, you sir, are a fag... Go rent Cold Mountain. If you want swashbuckling, robot-butt-kicking excitement, go see Joe and the gang fighting the good fight for the good of humanity. Oh, and one more uber-sweet thing about Sky Cap.; It makes references to tons of other movies, sure, but the really cool thing is that the movies it references are not modern ones. It has cameos of the giant freighter from King Kong, the SS Venture (complete with giant cage), and The Wizard of Oz (in more than one scene as you'll see by the end), and I'm also pretty sure that the Titanic was there too... Have to see it again to make sure.
The MALCOLM Z of Tomorrow
What the FUCK is wrong with these motherfucker crackers in Hollywood today?! It's bad e-fuckin-nuff that there weren't no damn brothers in movies made back in the 1930s... Unless they's just wanted some black man to play a retarded old stereotypical, uneducated moron... But now this "retro" shit has to come out and pretend that there were no black people before 1941... Back when they made us sign up to fight they's white war goin' on over in Europe for them. White devil bitches!!
I mean even ol' George Lucas got smart and put the main man Lando "Colt 45" Calrissian in his second Star Wars movie. And THAT, my brothers, is why Empire was the greatest Star Wars movie ever. Fuck that "I am your father, Luke, so I'm really not black under all this black shit" scene between Luke and that wannabee black man, Vader. It was Lando who made that shit fly! Hell, even Raiders of the Lost Indiana had that cool black captain who helped Indiana get away with the God box at the end of that film... But Sky Cap'n? Heeeeeeeell no! Instead they said "Well, let's put in 'Hot Lips' Jolie with an eye patch and say she's in charge of the royal air force or some shit... We don't need no colored people." Well FUCK YOU, racist motherfuckers... I'm just gonna stay at home and watch me some goddamn fuckin' Candyman instead. Then I'll catch Sanford and Son at 11.
The High Flying JAIME
Ooooooooo! Jude Law is totally dreamy. He was soooooo hot as Gigolo Joe in A.I. And when he played that soldier in Enemy At The Russian Gates I just got all warm and tingly inside. Oh! Oh! And I just adored him in Cold Mountain! Jude! Jude, if you read this, I love you! Kiff would understand! Please!!! Give me a chance, Jude! Hey, Jude!
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