Will Sawyer (Dwayne Johnson) starts the film as an FBI Hostage Rescue team leader. During a hostage situation where things quickly go bad, Sawyer winds up injured and loses his left leg. Jumping forward a few years, Sawyer is now a family man and living with his wife Sarah (Neve Campbell) and their two children – Georgia (McKenna Roberts) and Henry (Noah Cottrell).
Having had to leave the FBI, Sawyer is now a skyscraper security and safety specialist. He’s just landed a contract, thanks to the help of his friend Ben (Pablo Schreiber), to inspect The Pearl – the world’s tallest skyscraper which is situated in Hong Kong.
The Pearl stands at a mighty 3500ft. tall, dwarfing Dubai’s Burj Khalifa by almost 800ft. The bottom half of the building is open for business, the middle section features an impressive park while most of the top half is going to be residential. The Sawyer’s are the first family to move into the residential area while Will carries out his contract.
Watch the official Skyscraper trailer below:
[brid video=”271634″ player=”531″ title=”Skyscraper Official Trailer HD”]
Skyscraper is written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber who previously worked on Central Intelligence with Johnson. It takes inspiration from films such as Die Hard and The Towering Inferno. Hearing that really increased my expectations of the film and I felt they really pulled it off.
With the setup out of the way the film moves onto the main event. The Pearl’s billionaire owner, Zhoa Long Ji (Chin Han), is based in the penthouse. He is targeted by terrorists who end up setting his skyscraper on fire as part of their plan and frame Sawyer for the attack. With his family trapped inside, Sawyer springs into action to try and save the day.
Johnson shines throughout and easily carries the film on his broad shoulders. As you’d expect he fits right into the action but here he also gets to show off his softer, caring side. The love he has for his family is enough to make him risk his life without a second thought. Campbell does a good job too as his wife and the pair work well together on screen.
The film is ridiculously entertaining with plenty of big, over the top action sequences. These are best enjoyed if you don’t think about them too much as many seem unbelievable if not impossible in the real world. Johnson’s performance has you rooting for Sawyer and it really doesn’t matter if he could actually jump from a crane into a burning building, clamber round the outside using duct tape or hold a bridge up with his bare hands.
As much as I enjoyed it, and could forgive the unbelievable parts, there was some room for improvement. I felt the villain, Kores Botha (Roland Møller) was a little weak and his motivations and plan were a bit silly. Also, being set in China, it was good to see a decent sized Asian cast but it felt they were a little underutilised.
Skyscraper is an absolute riot that’s perfect for action fans looking to switch off and be entertained. If you enjoyed Die Hard then there’s plenty to like here. For Dwayne Johnson fans, Skyscraper is not to be missed.
Cast: Dwayne Johnson, Neve Campbell, Pablo Schreiber, Chin Han, Roland Møller, Noah Taylor, Hannah Quinlivan Director: Rawson Marshall Thurber Writer: Rawson Marshall Thurber Certificate: 12A Duration: 102 mins Released by: Universal Pictures Release date: 13th July 2018
