Review of Skyscraper Movie
Skyscraper certainly brings out its best: as a former soldier, FBI agent Will Sawyer, Johnson is tasked with taking on an army of bad guys with little more than his fists, his wits, and a roll of duct tape.
Left with a prosthetic leg after a hostage situation years earlier, Will’s left his gun-wielding days behind him and embarked on a new career as a security specialist. Will is given the task of assessing the safety of a 3500-foot building after he was stationed in Hong Kong as a security specialist. Built by business magnate Zhao Min Zhi (Chin Han), it’s a high-tech luxury apartment and office block with state-of-the-art fire-control systems and - in a curious flourish - a huge spherical viewing platform at the top which provides a 360-degree view of the island.
Then the attack. Despite having sort out to be a security specialist in Hong Kong, Will is attacked and faced with another problem he has to solve. The villain from Europe causing panic and inferno in the building.
Before he knew what was really going on, there was a fire in the 96th floor where his ex-army wife and two kids are trapped inside. Things become too much as there are goons everywhere with machine guns and grenade.
Twists and turns occur with metronomic timing, and if you’ve seen enough of these kinds of movies, then you’ll probably be able to guess the pay-offs by watching the set-ups. As ever, though, Johnson makes for a charismatic and likable guide through the action set-pieces, and Thurber (who writes as well as directs) finds novel uses for everything from old statues to bits of string to spare parts hurriedly stripped from a gas oven.
The cast has an uncanny valley feel, too: the bad guy, played by Roland Moller, is a bland collection of army fatigues and utility belts who could've phased in from a Call Of Duty game. Pablo Schreiber has little to do as one of Will's friends from his FBI days, and the normally wonderful Noah Taylor puts in a frankly bizarre performance as one of Zhao Min Zhi's corporate drones.
