Like "Raiders of the Lost Ark", "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" - first-time writer-director Kerry Conran's CGI-fest which places live actors, filmed entirely against a blue screen, in a stylized New York of the 40s plagued by giant robots - mines the plots and characters of early movie serials to create the dashing titular hero (Jude Law) and his reporter love interest, Polly Perkins (Gwyneth Paltrow). Also along for the ride is Dex Dearborn (Giovanni Ribisi), Sky Captain's trusty right-hand man and all-around Scotty to his Captain Kirk. It's obvious even from the character names that Mr. Conran has a good grasp on his source material. The problem is, he doesn't do anything with it.
"Sky Captain" is certainly a technical achievement for Mr. Conran and his team, but rather than using his source material to create something new, or even a witty homage, he just treads over the same ground. I suppose we're meant to watch in awe of the spectacular art direction of the film, and certainly there are some great shots, but amazingly, for a movie designed entirely as a special effect extravaganza involving giant robots attacking Manhattan from a secret base in Shangri-La, "Sky Captain" has very few surprises. The blue-gray tones of the film are so muted they are almost bland and the script, full of flat flirtatious bickering between Sky and Polly, is as dry as they come. As usual, if half the time spent on the special effects was spent on the script, there might have been a character or moment worth caring about in the film. As it is, every moment is predictable, the dialogue - especially aforementioned bickering - is second-rate, and even the acting is sub par.
Like Brendan Fraser in "The Mummy", Jude Law makes you realize what an underrated actor Harrison Ford really is. As Sky (whose rank is Captain, which I guess makes him Capt. Captain), Mr. Law is too aloof to generate the rugged charisma of, say, an Indiana Jones. Giovanni Ribisi, always a pleasure to watch, loosens things up a little as Dex. Ms. Paltrow in particular, certainly more accustomed to practical filmmaking techniques, seems uncomfortable in her role of plucky reporter Polly Perkins. Prone to danger by design, her character is required to appear on screen with the massive robots that march down the Manhattan streets. Mr. Conran is clearly a talented technician (cleverly using archival footage, he may actually coax the best performance in the film out of the late Laurence Olivier as the evil Totenkopf), but even with all his CGI wizardry, Mr. Conran is not able to convincingly combine live actors and computer-created creatures.
Could "Sky Captain" be a view of things to come? Will more films in the future forsake actual sets in favor of virtual terrain? From "King Kong" to the Ray Harryhausen creature features of the 60s and 70s to the most recent "Star Wars" debacles, filmmakers have been combining live actors with animated co-stars since filmmaking began. Technically, these effects have come very far, but "Tomorrow" is still a long way off.
Editor's Note: The most exciting moment of my screening of "Sky Captain" occurred when the projector snagged and then burned the film completely in half. It is my hope that the irony of an entirely digital movie set in the 1940s being transferred to film only to have the film disintegrate is not lost on anyone.
