198.
Skyscraper
6.5/10
'The Rock' Dwayne Johnson is back in action in a movie, which name doesn't conceal any sort of location spoilers. A trailer which shows us everything that we need to know regarding this storyline, we are about to witness a guy climb a multi-story building in order to save his family. We are revolving around the life of a security expert, played by Johnson, named Will Sawyer and are about to see some far-fetched leaps and climbs by this man in an act of desperation. Alongside Neve Campbell, who I haven't seen personally since the Scream franchise, Roland Moller who is fast becoming a known villain and Chin Han, who has chucked his hat into some other movies, they complete the list of recognised faces for me. This has all the making of a Gerard Butler type movie, so let's see if 'rises' above the rest.
The film opens with a history of how Will lost his leg. In case I didn't mention, he's got a fake leg from the knee down. He is trying to break up a hostage situation, as a man is holding his family hostage. Will manages to talk him down from using his gun but he ends up blowing himself, his family and most of Will's team, up. Will is taken to hospital in a series condition, where he is treated by a nurse named Sarah, played by Neve. 10 years later and we are in Hong Kong, watching Will put on his leg and getting ready for a meeting. He is now married to Sarah, has twins and is on his way to meet the architect who created the building called The Pearl. He is also met by Ben, who was there are the hostage situation and suffered burns on his face and neck. Instantly a sign of a bad guy. He gives the rest of the family tickets to the zoo and takes Will to see Zhao. In the meeting, there is also another partner, named Mr Pierce and Will is handing a tablet that scans his face to allow him access to all of the systems. We then cut to see Ben in communication with someone regarding Will being in possession of tablet and is ordered to get him onto a boat. This is going to end well for someone. Will continues on the tour of the building and is taken to the top floor after seeing the ecosystem that runs the air levels. The top floor is completely covered in special mirrors which allows a sky-high view of the city as if you were walking on nothing but air.
Will and Ben leave and are heading to a boat, of course, where a guy steals Will's bag and although Ben tries to stop him, in order to cover up that he is involved, the thief gets away. They get back to Ben apartment to cool down and Will reveals that he had the tablet inside his jacket all along and it was never taken. We can instantly see Ben's face change and he calls his boss for a backup plan.
Back at the Pearl, where Will's new apartment is situated, we see a gang of criminals begin a break in through a basement wall. Sarah and the kids have returned early from the zoo because one of the kids had gotten sick. On the way back to their room, they actually bump into two of the criminals, which Sarah is shocked about, knowing that they should be the only ones there. They are disguised as staff members, but Sarah still doesn't like the look of it. She closes the door and we see the criminals discuss the fact that the family wasn't meant to be home, before meeting up with the rest of the gang. Sarah also noticed a name on the boxes they were carrying. The guys start to spread a powder across the floor, a powder which is ignited by water. The leader, played by Roland and named Kores Botha, uses a flare to start the sprinklers off and boom, we have a blaze. When Will starts to head home, Ben pulls a gun on him, wanting the tablet. This leads to a pretty decent, if not brief, fight scene with Ben taking Will's leg and Will hoping around but still holding his own. Ben ends up accidentally shooting himself in the chest and on his deathbed, he tells Will that his family was never meant to be there and all the villains wanted was the tablet. He looks out of the window and sees the fire from across the skyline.
As he tries to leave, other thugs show up, forcing him down the fire escape and into the ally, where a female henchwoman named Xia is waiting. She gets the better of an already drained Will and takes the tablet, scanning his face first and then leaving the other men to end the job. The police show up, giving Will the chance to leave but also Xia, who heads off in a car. Will makes it out onto the streets, where he sees his own face on a giant monitor. He is being hunted in connection with the fire in The Pearl. He once again manages to escape, making his way to a massive crane next-door and we can all guess what is coming next.
Back inside the building, Sarah is trying to keep the smoke outside of the room and as if things weren't bad enough, one of the twins Henry has asthma. Elsewhere, Xia has made it to the control centre and her men have killed the technicians, whilst her hacker gets to work. Will has already begun the climb on the crane and is being set after by some guards and policemen.
He manages to lock the top door and then use the crane, hooking it to an open window. Great shot. Almost too great. He runs to the end of the crane, leaping off and only just making it to the window, with applause from every viewer below. Inspector Wu and other officials realise that he is heading inside for his family. Zhao is still in his office up top and once he realises what is happening, leaves with his bodyguard for the chopper but on arrival, the bodyguard realises that it isn't their normal pilot. Botha and his gang, along with Pierce the silently nervous bad guy, arrive to try and escape on the helicopter, giving us a little gunfight. They want a flash drive that Zhao is carrying but before they can retrieve it, Zhao heads back to lock himself in his office.
Sarah has decided its no longer safe to stay in the room and heads out to find a safer place.
Pierce finds them on their travels and tries to take them before Sarah stabs him with some scissors. She sends the kids off across a bridge and when she breaks free, she tries to follow them before a pillar comes down and crashes through the bridge. Pierce closes in but enter Will. Being the hero that he was always going to be in this movie, he pushes Pierce into the fire, as we watch one of the twins make it to an artificial waterfall for safety. Will uses a plank to get Sarah and one of the kids across the broken bridge and of course, it looks like it will fall but Will is there with his brute force, to hold it steady. Will sends the family down in an elevator, cutting its wires so that it travels faster and Sarah pulls the break at the right time in order to save themselves. It was another cliché moment as she struggled to reach the level first of all. As for the other kid, Georgia, she is still on the run after getting to the waterfall. Two gunmen have found her and although Will manages to get to her and have a fight, she is still taken and used as a hostage to get Will to find a way into Zhao's office.
Will heads out to override the security systems but in doing this, must scale the side of the building. He ties a rope around himself, covers his feet in duct tape and makes his way behind some fans to turn the systems off. This is a great advert for duct tape, seriously. Watch this scene and tell me how this would work in real life. As for the fans he has to jump through, I've been hit by a parked car so god knows how he did that. Will makes his way back but the rope slips and attaches itself to his fake leg. He flips around, grabs his leg and pulls himself back through the window in which he started. Zhao tries to close the doors back up but Will makes it in and takes him down whilst a gun is pointed at him. He forces Zhao to explain what this is about.
Back below, Sarah has made it to Inspector Wu and is updated on Botha's history. Wu's partner still suspects Will is up to something and that even Sarah would be in on it. This is spun on its head as Sarah helps the investigation but telling them that she noticed all the men wearing parachutes. They never planned on staying around long. Zhao has given his explanation. He had worked with Botha before and refused to pay him. With this Botha promised he would never let him finish the Pearl, so was paid. This then leads to the villains finding out that Zhao had files on all of the criminal's teams that Botha had been involved with and this is the reason why he wants that flash drive. Will pleads with his new boss to help him because they have his daughter. They decide to meet with everyone on the roof. This plan goes to shit as Zhao is only thinking of himself. He takes a gun and the flash drive and tries to make an exit before a deal to get Georgia back can even happen. He orders Botha to give him a parachute and Botha has one of his men do so. In another turn of events, Zhao comes back onside, fighting the villains at the side of Will before leading them into the room of mirrors, confusing them as Will goes after his daughter and at the same time, killing most of the criminals. The mirrors are creating more than one target obviously and now a grenade has gone off and blown a hole in the floor. Will finally has Botha cornered but the guy has Georgia and a grenade, sending us back to the same situation to which the movie started. He is ordered to get the flash drive for him but Will reveals one thing, Botha is talking to a mirror and Will was behind him all along. Will boots him through the hole and saves his daughter and Zhao, as the three make their way down to safety.
Back to Sarah and they have located the landing area if the criminals had taken flight. They come across Xi, who nearly chokes out Sarah, but is defeated with a boot to the face. Sarah takes the tablet and resets all of The Pearl's systems in order to fight the fire. A helicopter arrives to get Will, Georgia and Zhao and on questioned regarding what Zhao will do next, he simply answers, 'rebuild'. The family reunites, as the crowd cheers them on. Wu meets Will, impressed with his antics and his family, to which Will agrees as the four walk off to go home. Wait. Where is home now?
The only way to watch this movie is to not take it in any sort of seriousness. You can see from the trailer that this was going to be an action movie that would push the boundaries of humour at times and this was seen in more than one occasion when it came to the storyline. That's not saying that it was terrible. It was actually quite enjoyable when you sat and just wanted some escapism. It was one of the weakest movies that Dwayne Johnson has done for a while, so we will forgive that but at times, it seemed like this guy was superhuman, not some ordinary bloke trying to help his family. Visually, the movie was great, it looked great and the fight scenes were non-stop at times with some great camera angles to continue the flow and make it feel like the audience was being chucked about. The story, if looking at it deeply is very very cliché. Overall, people and studios need to realise that just having a visually good-looking movie doesn't work anymore if the writing isn't there for the rest of the movie.
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