Dark Skies
Scott Stewart
The story: Strange things are happening at the Barrett residence. Lacy (Keri Russell) and Daniel (Josh Hamilton) try to make sense of what is happening while protecting their two boys, Jesse (Dakota Goyo) and Sammy (Kadan Rockett).

This is the kind of movie where the less you know about it, the more effective it is.
It opens with scenes of normal suburban life – children playing in the streets, a lawn being watered, a barbecue gathering.
Then something happens in the Barrett household.
Someone, or something, comes into their kitchen at night and leaves a mess. It could almost be a prank though Lacy wonders what would eat the lettuce but leave the bacon. A giant rabbit with opposable thumbs is her husband’s quick comeback.
From this almost innocuous incident, writer-director Scott Stewart (Priest, 2011) slowly escalates the tension and the stakes as the incidents get harder and harder to explain away.
A big part of why the movie works is due to the casting.
Keri Russell was defined by the college student title role she played in the television drama Felicity (1998-2002) and it is nice to see that she has matured into a compelling actress without any offscreen drama, thank you very much.
She is well-matched by Josh Hamilton, an actor better known for his work on Broadway in award-winning plays such as Proof (2000) and The Coast Of Utopia (2002).
They are believable as a regular couple coping with ordinary pressures, from keeping up with mortgage payments to trying to build a better life for their family.
Adding to the sense of reality is Dakota Goyo (Real Steel, 2011) as a 13-year-old beginning to be interested in girls and to chafe at parental restrictions. At the same time, he is also a protective sibling to his younger and possibly over- imaginative brother (Kadan Rockett).
There is also a nice dynamic between Lacy the believer and Daniel the sceptic when things get more hairy, a gender reversal of the Mulder-Scully relationship in the iconic sci-fi series The X-Files (1993-2002).
Even when the movie moves into familiar Paranormal Activity (2007) territory as Daniel installs surveillance cameras in the house, Stewart manages to hold your attention.
The film could have easily elicited snorts given its subject matter, but by the time the word “aliens” is mentioned, the moviegoer is an hour into the film, and Dark Skies has cast an unsettling spell.
(ST)