Skinjacker
The island of Skye off the north west coast of Scotland, the only barrier between it and the storms coming off the Atlantic Ocean the thin strip of the Outer Hebrides, and it is from the sky that the object comes, a streak of light falling in the grey dawn hours to crash down unobserved beyond the farmhouses but waking the locals with the sound of its descent, though what emerges will have a greater impact on their lives.
A husband and wife living near the hillside where the object buried itself, a man taking his teenage granddaughter back to Inverness, four young sightseers in their caravan, a man on his motorbike, and three violent criminals conspicuously failing to maintain a low profile following an armed robbery on the mainland, all travelling the lonely country roads and finding their engines cut out, hunted by the thing hiding beneath the twisted branches of the wind-blown trees…
An ambitious low-budget science fiction horror thriller directed by David Izatt, by his own admission the alien threat was added late into Skinjacker to add an additional level to the more tangible threat posed by the thuggish Baz, mouthy Sarah and the violently unstable Trevor (Gareth Morrison, Nicolette McKeown and Johnny Panchaud) countered with calm reserve by Jimmy (Marcus Macleod), and the largely unseen visitor feels correspondingly incidental even as it precipitates events, stranding them all and draining their mobile phones of charge.
The experience of the cast a broad spectrum, their abilities are poorly showcased by Izatt’s bare bones script which gives too many people too little to do when the motivations and responses of the more interesting participants should be the focus, instead leaving superfluous characters hanging about looking frustrated and confused, Finn (Ryan Livingstone) particularly poorly served when the police finally happen by and rather than coherently explaining the situation and requesting help babbling over and over how unbelievable it all is.
With the magnificent and moody setting of the iconic fogbound rocks and lochs of Skye a backdrop established in a handful of second unit shots, the principal filming location of Skinjacker is the less dramatic but more accessible fields and forests of the Kingdom of Fife, a discontinuity more forgivable than the heavy-set titular extra-terrestrial nasty masquerading as someone of significantly different height and build by scalping them and wearing their hair.
Descending into the underground chamber of the alien vessel for the final scenes, the only visible sign above ground a copiously smoking metal chimney, instead of urgency and stealthy investigation there is instead shouting as the survivors bumble about with no clue what they are doing and no plan to get out, the big beastie’s purpose on Earth never considered but perhaps as simple as directing its own alien version of Darwinian, culling the less worthy individuals of the herd to strengthen the whole.
Skinjacker is currently playing the festival circuit prior to wider distribution
