Film Review

‘Sky Captain, World of Tomorrow’
Recalls Ghost of Movies’ Past

By: Eliot John Hagen (February 10, 2005)

Don’t be too apprehensive of the movie due to its title, for it wasn’t half bad.  Jude Law plays Sky Captain, a dashing young rogue who is afraid of nothing save for commitment to Polly Parker, the blonde 1950’s equivalent of Lois Lane.

After an attack on New York and the disappearance of six renowned German scientists, Polly Parker and Sky Captain start out on a quest to save their friend, a radio operator named Dex (played by Giovanni Ribisi) and kill an insane German scientist named Totenkopf (played by a digitally re-created Laurence Olivier).

One of the unique things about this movie is how it was made.  Filmed entirely on a green screen, almost everything except the actors and a few props is computer generated.  The film quality has a strange newsreel feeling to it, and, while it is in color, it was originally shot in black and white and, essentially, colorized.

“Sky Captain” is about as “retro” as you can get, complete with vintage fighter jets, luxury cars, typewriters, spinning headlines, gigantic robots that look like they were taken from “The Day The Earth Stood Still,” and even a Hindenburg docking at the top of the Empire State Building.

It’s not what you would call corny, but it is just so nostalgic that you can’t help but liking it a little.  There are a few good jokes and some nice action scenes and a twist that I did not see coming.  On the whole, it’s an entertaining movie.