Sky DVD Review

• Actors: Diane Kruger, Norman Reedus
• Director: Fabienne Berthaud
• Disc Format: Color, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Subtitles: Spanish
• Region: Region 1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated:
  Unrated
• Studio: MPI HOME VIDEO
• DVD Release Date: August 16, 2016
• Run Time: 106 minutes

        Sky begins as a thriller, drifts into a road trip romance, and ultimately ends as an unrealistic Midwestern melodrama. The only consistency throughout all of it is Diane Kruger’s performance, despite the fact that the screenplay doesn’t provide much depth to the film’s protagonist, or any of the supporting characters she meets along the way. This is a film which is more dedicated to the melancholy of each moment rather than the details which have made each character so depressing. Life is hard, seems to be the message, and it doesn’t particularly matter why.

        This seemingly directionless road trip soap opera begins with Romy (Kruger) on vacation in California with her frustrated husband (Gilles Lellouche). For two people on vacation, they don’t seem to be having any fun at all. There are hints later in the script that it may be due to a number of miscarriages in their relationship, but Romy is a dark cloud of moodiness regardless of the reason. After her husband becomes so tired of her sour attitude that he crosses the line physically, Romy wastes no time bashing him over the head with a motel lamp.

        After a fair amount of time misleading the audience into thinking the film has turned into a thriller about Romy escaping her husband’s murder, we discover that he is fine. A quick hospital visit is all it takes for the marriage to dissolve, and Romy moves on to explore the United States on her own. This begins with a trip to Vegas where Romy pairs up with a street performer (Laurene Landon) until she is propositioned by a rugged cowboy, Diego (Norman Reedus) who admits to only sleeping with prostitutes.  

        Although Diego is hardly much of an improvement on her husband, Romy inexplicably follows him back to his humble home where he continues to treat her in a sub-par manner. Romy gets a job waiting tables at a local diner in the small town (despite merely being a foreigner on vacation), meets Diego’s extended family (dominated by Lena Dunham as the obnoxious sister-in-law), and moves in with the stoic cowboy. The remainder of the film becomes about Remy’s struggle to get Diego to admit his feeling for her, which is a confusing turn of events after watching the inexplicable rejection of her husband. One can’t help but wonder if the appeal of Diego has something to do with his lack of interest, whereas the obvious affections of her husband (however misguided his approach) were so definitively rejected.

        The problem with the screenplay by Pascal Arnold and director Fabienne Berthaud is that it mistakes ambiguity with a lack of characterization. There is so little offered about each of the characters, I found it extremely difficult to understand their motivations or care what happened to them. It does not help that the most dramatic events are chosen to occur, despite a subdued approach to nearly every scene. The result is somewhat like watching paint dry, while simultaneously being told that the paint is lead-based and exposure will have deadly consequences.

        There are no special features on the DVD.

Entertainment Value: 4.5/10

Quality of Filmmaking: 6/10

Historical Significance:  2/10

Special Features: 0/10