| SKY HIGH |
 2005 - USADirector: Mike Mitchell
- Reviewed by Vickie
The colorful story centers on teenager Will Stronghold (Michael Angarano), the seemingly ordinary offspring of two extraordinary parents&151;renowned superheroes The Commander (Kurt Russell) and Jetstream (Kelly Preston). They believe their son will follow in their life-saving footsteps and thus enroll him at Sky High, a training-ground/high school for young superheroic teens. Thing is, superpowers kind of show up like puberty, unexpectedly at different times for different folks, and Will is something of a power-less late bloomer. His best friend is Layla (Danielle Panabaker), who’s sort of a wickedly intense Mother Nature type, and the duo soon find themselves immersed in a sea of strangely gifted kids divided into two classes (“heroes” and “sidekicks”) according to the level and wow-factor of their respective abilities. Much to his own chagrin and that of his parents, Will is relegated to “hero support” along with Layla and their new pals: shape-shifting Magenta (Kelly Vitz), who can turn herself into a guinea pig; bespectacled Ethan (Dee-Jay Daniels), who can melt on command; and tall, gangly Zach (Nicholas Braun), who glows in the dark. Problems arise when a nefarious force begins plotting the downfall of The Commander and Jetstream, while a fire-conjuring-but-smouldering-hot bully named Warren Peace (Steven Strait) makes school life a living hell for Will, who’s desperate to fit in, get his powers and win the heart of the Stepford-esque, “technopath” (she can control electronics with her mind) student-body president (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). To avoid boring you with too many details, I’ll cut right to the chase: this movie is like The Breakfast Club meets The Superfriends meets MadTV. It combines elements from the typical high-school dramedy with the world of sci-fi/fantasy and wraps it all in really, really, really smart humor. Standard-issue problems are replaced with those that might relate to a superhero. Instead of math, the kids study “rays”: death rays, freeze rays, heat rays. Sidekicks are asked not to order hero sandwiches in the cafeteria. Detention is a room where superpowers are rendered useless. And forget dodgeball&151;in this school, “gym class” means a rousing game of Save the Citizen, where players choose sides to either rescue or eviscerate a humanoid dummy. The screenplay is breezy and sharp and quick, ensuring that everything and everyone who appears onscreen is there for a distinct reason. It’s loaded with subtle asides and pay-attention-or-you’ll-miss-them gags, yet nothing is extraneous, nothing is inconsequential and nothing pops up just for the sake of killing time. It reminded me a lot of Pixar films like Finding Nemo, where it’s obvious that a great deal of thought went into even the tiniest, otherwise insignificant detail to make the whole project that much better. In addition to its well-crafted story, Sky High soars thanks to its brilliant array of characters and the people who play them. The young cast members are great, but even better are the veteran comic talents who step into the roles of Sky High’s faculty – Dave Foley as forgotten-sidekick-turned-nebbish-and-bitter-teacher Mr. Boy (a shortened version of his once glorious moniker, All-American Boy), Kevin McDonald as sizably skulled “mad science” instructor Mr. Medulla, and Bruce Campbell as Sonic Boom, the obnoxious, testosterone-y and ridiculously funny athletics coach. They alone make the movie more than worth seeing, and their dry delivery of throwaway lines made me bust out laughing repeatedly. I kind of feel like I've written this review as a ten year old would, and that I'm shouting at you excitedly, "And then THIS happened! And then this part was cool! And then this was funny!", but such is the film side effect. I watched it with a huge grin slapped on my face, and with the gleeful glee of a little kid. But I’d just as soon not reveal all of the film’s wonderful bits, since part of the fun is experiencing them for yourselves. Suffice it to say that Sky High may wind up on my Top 10 of 2005…and that’s saying a lot for what seems on the surface to be a deceptively benign kids’ action movie that actually knocks the stuffing out of most of the Big-Budget High-Concept Poop that’s been released so far this summer. |
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You know, I think this might be one of my favorite films of the summer.
It’s funny, it’s mildly subversive, it’s flashy, it’s fun and, above
all, it’s really entertaining. Go figure that the filmmakers could
successfully churn out a family-friendly movie that’s clever enough for
kids and grown-ups alike to enjoy in a season where most movies barely
manage to appeal to one of those groups, if either.
