The Reel Review
When a car that had belonged to her long-missing ufologist father mysteriously crashes through the roof of a local barn years after his disappearance, a teenage girl convinced that he was abducted by a UFO contacts his former colleagues to help find him. Inez Dahl Torhaug and Jesper Barkselius star in this Swedish sci-fi/mystery.
Featuring first-of-its-kind, AI “visual dubbing” to make mouth movements match the audio dubbing of Swedish into English, Watch the Skies (initially released in 2022 as UFO Sweden) is an odd, way less charming mashup of The Goonies and Stranger Things, as the protagonist enlists the help of a quirky group of misfits. Even the score feels like a blatant rip-off of Stranger Things. And as far as the AI visual dubbing goes, sometimes it is good, but other times it still looks and sounds more like a bad English-language dub of 1950s Japanese Godzilla movies.
Torhaug gives a convincing performance as the rebellious teen, despite the challenge of liking her character when she so frequently endangers the lives of those around her. The film also would have benefitted from more development of the quirky ufologists and Eva Melander (Border) as the villainous scientist. While it is a very average film, Watch the Skies is worth checking out for those curious about the AI visual dubbing.
REEL FACTS
• Flawless AI is the company that visually edited the character’s mouth movements to match the cast’s English language dubs of the original Swedish. Flawless AI co-founder Scott Mann says this will be a game changer in creating a more global audience for films.
• Stockholm native Inez Dahl Torhaug is the daughter of actors Kirsti Eline Torhaug and Henrik Dahl.
• Watch the Skies received three nominations at the 2023 Guldbagge Awards, the Swedish equivalent to the Academy Awards – for Best Editing, Best Visual Effects and the Audience Award.
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