Burn Baby Burn

Our local free weekly listed Skyscraper as the number 1 worst movie of 2018. Several podcasts we enjoy also ridiculed it. So of course it was the first Netflix movie we watched in 2019.

It starts with star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson getting his legs blown off in a hostage situation. Ten years later, he is in Hong Kong, getting ready to complete his security audit of the world’s tallest building (named after a Mad Scientist), the Pearl. His wife, Neve Campbell, and two adorable kids are staying in a luxury apartment in the otherwise empty tower. They are planning to go to the night-time panda feeding at the zoo, while Johnson’s buddy Pablo Schreiber takes him to see the bosses.

They give him the tablet that controls the building’s security and safety features (AKA the MacGuffin), keyed to only Johnson’s biometrics. On their way to the offsite control center, someone tries to steal the MacGuffin. Then it turns out that Campbell is bringing the kids back (their son had an asthma attack), skipping the pandas. They notice a sketchy security crew on their floor, but don’t see them setting a huge fire two floors down.

So we have an updated Towering Inferno with some Die Hard thrown in. The Rock is blamed for the fire, since he was supposed to have the MacGuffin, and only he seems to know that his wife and kids are trapped above the fire. So he has to avoid the police, climb a flaming building, rescue his family, and the billionaire who owns the building, and get the bad guys. And he looks great doing it.

I won’t try to tell you that this movie makes much sense. But I will tell you:

• In an early fight scene, one of the Rock’s prosthetic legs gets torn off. Yes, he is a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest.
• The bad guy hackers, even though they have the MacGuffin, still whisper “We’re in!” when they hack the security system.
• Campbell barely needs rescuing, kicking all kinds of butt and pointing the police at the bad guys.
• Hall of Mirrors fight at the end, as homage to Lady from Shanghai (or homage to one of its homages).
• To fix the security system, they turn the building off and on again.

And this doesn’t even cover the Rock covering his hands in duct tape and climbing the outside of the building.

I will admit the that villain, Roland Moller, is no Hans Gruber. His character is named “Botha”, but not “Botha Deez Nutz”. Also, the action is over the top and the plot nonsensical. But they must have known that - this much camp (“We’re in!”) can’t be accidental.

It might just be how darned likable Mr. The Rock is. But I would rank this up with San Andreas and Rampage, and above The Meg. That may be damn faint praise, but it’s good enough for us.