DARK SKIES – The Blu Review

DARK SKIES was a derivative yet engaging affair that hit the spot and gave me 97 minutes of genuine chills and thrills. It was not well-received when it opened theatrically in February and I never got around to seeing it. Maybe it was bad timing, what with its ad campaign that made it look like the Paranormal Activity movies, which it is similar to except it plays as a thriller instead of a found-footage tape, and with aliens as the home invaders rather than evil spirits. That’s a shame, because despite some forgivable flaws, DARK SKIES is a genuinely scary movie. Now it can be rediscovered on the new Blu-ray disc from Starz/Anchor Bay.

DARK SKIES a supernatural/sci-fi thriller that follows a young family living in the suburbs. As comfortably suburban husband and wife Daniel and Lacey Barret (Kerry Russell, Josh Hamilton) witness an escalating series of disturbing events involving their family, their safe and peaceful home quickly unravels. The younger of the couple’s two sons (Kadan Rockett) begins having strange dreams in which a faux-friendly presence visits and tells him creepy things. The older son (Dakota Goyo) seems somewhat immune to all these mysterious goings-on, but that may be because he’s preoccupied: He’s just at the age where he’s noticing girls, and the soft-core porn he watches while visiting the house of a slightly older pal has put some confused romantic ideas into his head involving a neighborhood cutie. When it becomes clear that the Barret family is being targeted by an unimaginably terrifying and deadly force, Daniel and Lacey take matters in their own hands to solve the mystery of what is after their family.

The roots of DARK SKIES can be traced back to POLTERGEIST, the 1982 shocker that saw the average American family besieged by an unwanted houseguest – a spook that targeted the youngest child. The Barret OF DARK SKIES are normal Americans enjoying the luxuries of suburbia, where the worst threat is a stubborn neighbor or a rude construction worker. The aliens attack pretty much out of the blue and therein lies the chills. Easy jump scares are absent, instead director Scott Stewart actually focuses on building tension and delivering honest payoffs. Stewart orchestrates a myriad of visual and aural delights (the soundtrack of this film is a technical marvel) and sells them hard, even though they don’t add up to anything particularly coherent. We never figure out the limits of the alien’s powers and there are more good ideas here than actual scares. Also, Kerry Russell and Josh Hamilton spend much of the first half of the film bickering in an unpleasant way that’s hard to sit through, but once the alien invasion plot kicks in, you genuinely start to care about the characters. By keeping the audience always on the side of the good guys and investing us in the minutae of their lives, he keeps us rooting for the team. There are some brief CGI effects late in the game, but they don’t submerge the story. Keri Russell is very good as a mother trying to hold everything together, increasingly fearful for her oddly behaving youngest son and there’s a nice cameo from J. K. Simmons, downplaying things effectively as a conspiracy buff who insists aliens are already amongst us.

DARK SKIES has a great 1080p HD transfer presented in 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The image looks gorgeous throughout the 97 minute run-time, with the flesh tones looking natural and smooth. The detail is crisp, with very clean closeups. The colors are well saturated and quite bold, especially in the interiors of the house. The black levels are deep and inky and everything seems to be true to its source. I did not notice any banding, aliasing, or artifacts. This is an outstanding video presentation for a small sci-fi movie and just adds that much more to the film. This release comes with an impressive audio mix that packs a serious punch. When watching this type of suspenseful sci-fi movie, you want your audio to slowly build, add some creepy surround ambient noises, and then pack a loud kick to make you jump out of your seat. This is what DARK SKIES does to a tee. The dialogue is always crystal clear and easy to understand. Even the tiny whispers can be heard clearly and are haunting all the same.

Extras include a feature commentary with Writer/Director Scott Stewart, Producer Jason Blum, Executive Producer Brian Kavanaugh-Jones and Editor Peter Gvozdas as well as alternate and deleted scenes from the film.