Sky Captain and the World Of Tomorrow

Reviewed by Rich Drees

     It seems that every new blockbuster film tries to stretch visual effects technology, presenting some new, hitherto unseen treat for moviegoers. So there’s a certain irony that film makes one of the biggest technological leaps in terms of utilizing computer generated imagery in its production should draw so heavily on inspiration from the past for its look.

     Ace reporter Polly Perkins (Gwyneth Paltrow) is on the trail of a hot story- leading scientists from around the world have been disappearing. Following an attack on Manhattan by ten story tall giant robots, she teams with freelance adventurer, and former lover, Sky Captain (Jude Law) to locate the mysterious Dr. Totenkopf, a reclusive German scientist behind the disappearances and quite possibly a plot to destroy the world. Their globe trotting adventure takes them from the concrete canyons of 1939 Manhattan to a hidden civilization in Nepal to an uncharted jungle island in the Pacific Ocean. Joining the duo is Sky Captain’s ingenious handyman Dex (Giovanni Ribisi) and Franky Cook (Angelina Jolie), a British fighter pilot with her own squadron of ace pilots at her disposal.

     Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow is a love letter to a bygone age. The movie is a grand adventure filtered through pulp magazines like G-8 and His Flying Aces and Doc Savage, Fleischer Studio’s Superman cartoons, 1950s EC Comics and the deco futurism of the 1939’s World’s Fair. Director Kerry Conran has dipped deep into the pulp tradition to pepper his movie with stalwart heroes, plucky heroines, mad scientists, mysterious women, giant robots, cool planes, lost civilizations, jungle islands populated by strange beasts, strange peril and daring escapes that will leave aficionados of such things laughing with surprise at each new thing he pulls out of his hat. Derivative? Sure, but never in a way that feels like we’re watching recycled ideas or that is condescending to the source material. It’s played straight, with no winking at the audience or sense of irony. In addition to the above-mentioned sources, sharp-eyed fans of fantastic cinema will detect visual tips of the fedora to King Kong (1933), Forbidden Planet (1956), Things To Come (1936), When Worlds Collide (1951), Godzilla (1954), and Bride of Frankenstein (1935). Conran loves this stuff and that love shows through in every frame of this movie. It’s a contagious love too, as Sky Captain is bound to leave anyone whose inner child has an unadulterated love of gee-whiz adventure smiling from start to finish.

     Early in the film, Polly heads to Radio City Music Hall to meet with a source for her story. As the two converse in the balcony, Judy Garland as Dorothy can be heard uttering the famous line, “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.” It’s an interesting choice of background business, as Sky Captain and the World Of Tomorrow is breaking new ground in the use of computer-generated imagery in motion pictures. With the exception of hand props virtually everything that the actors interact with was computer generated, added to footage of the actors shot in front of a blue screen. None of the sets- from Polly’s newspaper office to the frozen abandoned mine in the Himalayas- ever existed outside of computer files. The end result is a film that looks like a hand-tinted black and white photo or a hazy dream of a future that never came about. Some may find fault with the film’s non-photorealistic look, but they would be missing the point. Every element of the film’s visual aspect, from the saturation of colors to every design choice, is all part of a stylized look Conran is striving to achieve.

     But, unlike some other big budgeted, effects-laden films of the last few years whom we won’t name here, the visuals never gets in the way of the story. Sky Captain, Polly and Frankie are well drawn and have a history that plays out well over the film. The script also contains some nice comedic moments that counterpoint the adventure, rather than have the hero deliver stiff one-liners at the end of an action sequence. The film also ends with perhaps the best closing line of dialogue heard in a long time.

     There are a few minor quibbles to be had though. Law and Paltrow’s chemistry is uneven. Often there back and forth banter is just serviceable. But every now and then is a moment where they really trade sparks, which, enjoyable as they are, leaves one wishing they were firing on all cylinders for the whole movie. It also would have been fun to perhaps see more of Sky Captain’s Flying Legion. Sky Captain has a sprawling base of operations with squads of men and rows of planes on the tarmac waiting to take flight. For now, one will only be able to imagine what it will look like when the entire Flying Legion takes flight to stop some menace.

     It’s been recently reported that Conran has been signed to bring Tarzan-creator Edgar Rice Burroughs’s other pulp character, John Carter, Warlord of Mars, to the silver screen. While that may portend well for that project, I hope it also doesn’t mean a delay in returning to the fascinating world he’s created here for more adventures with Sky Captain.