Sky Kids: Buddy-Bonding in a Bi-Plane

 Sky Kids (2008), aka The Fly Boys,  is an old-fashioned buddy-bonding drama about two kids who save the day (not to be confused with the war movie Flyboys). 














Kyle (Reiley McClendon), the new kid at school in a stereotypic small town, defends chunky loner Jason (Jesse James) from bullies.  The two become friends, and hang out with Jason's Uncle Ed, a pilot who takes them up in a biplane (played by Dallen Gettling).

The next day they somehow end up trapped on an airplane with a bomb and no pilot.  They managed to land the plane safely, and become local celebrities.

The airplane belongs to mob boss Angelo Esposito (Tom Sizemore), who kidnaps the boys to find out who betrayed him by planting the bomb.  He has a change of heart and asks his associates Silvio and Lenny (Stephen Baldwin and J. Todd Adams) to take them home.



But, coincidentally, Silvio and Lenny are the culprits!  They plan to kill the boys so they won't talk.  In the resulting fight, Silvio is killed, and the boys escape. Kyle is re-captured. Now it is Jason's turn to be the hero. He rushes to find Uncle Ed, who offers to fly Lenny out of the country if he lets Kyle go.

The climactic adrenaline-rush flight involves Jason flying, Kyle being thrown off the plane, and Ed, Kyle, and Jason parachuting to safety while the plane crashes into a mountain.

Ok, the plot is a little convoluted, but throughout there's lots of buddy-bonding, some nick-of-time rescues, and no heterosexual interest (except maybe between Kyle's Mom and Uncle Ed).  No wonder it was never released in the U.S.



This movie has lots of fundamentalist Christian connections: Dallen Gettling is a graduate of Brigham Young University, Stephen Baldwin is a right-wing homophobe, and the writer, Gregory C. Haynes, is a graduate of Utah State, who also wrote Cowboys and Angels.  So we'll have to assume that the gay subtext is unintentional.

However, there are a few gay connections in the cast.  Reiley McClendon played a teen hustler in Nickel Children, and is currently a recurring character on the gay-positive family drama The Fosters.  J. Todd Adams, the villainous Lenny, has played gay characters (top photo: from A Picture of Dorian Gray).  

You can get it on R2 DVD from Amazon.uk.