Burn this Review if Your Going to Watch ‘Skyfire’ (Movie Review)

Skyfire

Rating: 4/10

Director: Simon West

Writers: Wei Bu, Sidney King

Style: Action Thriller

Time: 97 minutes

Trailer: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/skyfire_2021

Review by Mike Szymanski

If you want to see people burn or get hit by random lava bombs, then this one is for you. I love apocalyptic movies, but this is so derivative, it combines every trope from every movie like it and virtually steals scenes from the classic movies that are like it.

This is a Chinese disaster movie that brings in a big name (Raymond Burr in “Godzilla”) to attract Western audiences, and kind of borrows ideas from all the other movies that are even remotely like it.

Trying to get the taste of “Jurassic Park,” this focuses on a posh resort of thrill seekers who like to live on the edge and so they live on a dormant volcano. The cynical owners say “They love doing this stuff, but they know it is safe.”

Well, it’s not, of course, just like the bad idea of creating live dinosaurs for a park.

There is of course, the caring scientist who is trying to get everyone to listen that the inevitable is going to happen (put in your favorite here, mine is: “Don’t Look Up”).

Then, there’s the blatant rip-off of Julianne Moore falling in a bus that’s hanging over a ledge from the “Jurassic Park” films, and the other complete rip-off of the solution that seems to come right out of “Volcano” with Tommy Lee Jones and Anne Heche (diverting the lava into pipes).

Of course, there’s the sacrificing parent (“Dante’s Peak”) and the repressed love story (any and all), the piece of jewelry that has some meaning (“Titanic”) and the reunions of lost family.

Jason Isaacs plays the crass owner of the resort and we know him from playing pretty unsavory characters like Lucious Malfoy in the “Harry Potter” movies and Captain Hook in “Peter Pan” but he may want to incinerate all copies of this film as well.

The special effects and explosions are cool There’s nothing truly unpredictable.

The saucer-like thing that takes dozens of tourists down on a pole to the middle of the volcano that is “the safest place on Earth” is obviously not. The monorail that takes them safely up the side of the volcano is not safe at all, and pretty much the people you expect to survive or get their just desserts in the end all do so.

The well-meaning geologist who sounds the alarm is played by Xueqi Wang and he vowed to never return to this island after a suprise eruption killed his wife. But then, his daughter Meng (played by Hannah Quinlivan) takes over her mother’s work and her forecasting system doesn’t seem to matter to the greedy hotel owner (Jason Isaacs) who keeps the place open at all costs.

In a completely ridiculous scene, an underwater vent is supposedly pulling down a young woman and a guy goes to help her, but when he lamely ties her up to pull her away she swims in front of him, without any problem whatsoever.

Don’t waste your time on this one, if you want to see a good volcano movie watch Anne Heche in “Volcano” or Pierce Brosnan in “Dante’s Peak.”

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