SKYWHALES

 

Publicity still from the closing scene in Skywhales (© Phil Austin & Derek Hayes/Animation City/Channel 4 – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

They say that good things come in small packages, but rarely has this been more effectively demonstrated in the movie world than via a truly spellbinding animated sci fi/fantasy short film, just 11 minutes long, that I first viewed on TV one Sunday tea-time way back in the mid-1980s. Its title? Skywhales.

Directed (and also written) by Phil Austin and Derek Hayes, produced by Animation City for Channel 4 (a UK terrestrial TV channel), and first shown by the latter on Christmas Day 1983, but several times thereafter too, Skywhales packs an inordinate amount of visual detail and storytelling into such a short screen time.

Although not stated in the film itself, the name of the alien planet high above which all of the action takes place is Perle, and its lead character, a hunter, is named Nilbul (both facts ascertained via my background reading re Skywhales here). Perle's citizens, the Perlians, inhabit large floating Laputa-like islands of vegetation in the sky. They are a race of bipedal, superficially humanoid entities, but instantly distinguished by way of their green skin and their long-muzzled horse-like heads, which sport a range of distinctive Mohawk hairstyles.

The Perlians communicate via a whistling/burbling language vaguely reminiscent of that of the titular little aliens in the beloved 1960s/70s children's TV series The Clangers. Although unintelligible verbally to the viewers, it is rendered sufficiently coherent by the characters' attendant facial expressions and body language for us to follow the gist of what is being said by them during their conversations with one another.

The Perlian island featured in this movie is a fascinating land replete with the most bizarre, extraordinary-looking fauna and (especially) flora, which draw comparisons in my mind with the likes of Frank Frazetta's illustrations, the landscape in the surreal 1973 French animated movie La Planète Sauvage (=Fantastic Planet), and the artwork of  Rodney Matthews. Its marvels are a particular joy to behold during one scene where Nilbul is making his way through it to reach one of the three hunting sky ships currently docked on the island's easternmost rim.

 

The luxuriant jungle full of surreal flora and fauna through which Nilbul is making his way towards his ship on this island's easternmost rim in Skywhales (© Phil Austin & Derek Hayes/Animation City/Channel 4 – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

For Nilbul is not just a hunter, he is also the captain of that selfsame ship, which is due to set forth in the company of its two brethren sky vessels in a bold, fraught annual quest to seek out and harpoon a specimen of the most spectacular Perlian species of all – the enormous manta-like skywhale. Many of these long-necked aerial behemoths soar effortlessly through the vast heavens above Perle and its floating islands, their huge lateral wings lifting and lowering with genteel gracefulness, languidly propelling them through their empyrean empire.

Today, however, one will soon cease to do so, because Nilbul, albeit somewhat aged and having overslept, is determined not to allow his ship to set sail without him under the leadership of an underling. So despite his wife's attempt to keep him at home with her and their still-youthful son, Nilbul is having none of it, and when he reaches his ship he gives short shrift to his too-eager would-be replacement and takes command at once.

Prior to arriving at his ship, however, Nilbul experiences a decidedly odd happening in the jungle. Suddenly, two Perlians appear, both of them deathly white in colour with sunken black eyes, staring sightlessly ahead as they plod forward in eerie zombified fashion, heading towards the open doorway of a large round temple. Instantly, Nilbul shields his eyes with one hand, not looking at them and not continuing his journey to his ship either until they have passed by. What is happening? The astonishing answer is revealed a little later.

Aboard ship, Nilbul's vessel and its two cohorts are travelling through some thick mist when suddenly their crews hear the loud sonorous cry of a skywhale, and see a couple soaring close by. One of these mega-monsters succeeds in knocking two of the three ships out of the sky, but Nilbul's ship remains undamaged, and he successfully harpoons the skywhale. When a second harpoon hits it, the beast gradually tires, and is finally dragged down from the sky to the floating island below, where its entire body is butchered for its meat that the Perlians eat and for its hide that they use to construct their huts, until only its colossal skeleton remains.

That evening, Nilbul is sitting outside their hut with his wife and child when suddenly he feels chilled, and is horrified to see that his skin has turned white. Moments later, he stands up, his eyes now black, sunken, and unseeing, exactly like the two zombified Perlians he had encountered that same morning, and just like them he plods off, heading towards the large round temple that they had entered. His child tries to stop him, but is held back by his mother.

 

The floating Perlian island that is the setting in Skywhales (© Phil Austin & Derek Hayes/Animation City/Channel 4 – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

When Nilbul reaches the temple and steps inside, it is seen to contain a huge circular hole at its centre, with four guards standing around it, all of whom shield their eyes when they see Nilbul enter. Standing in the temple's doorway, not attempting to enter but watching with great sadness, are his wife and child, as Nilbul walks up to the edge of the great hole. Wisps of a gaseous substance rise up from his body as he tumbles downwards, down into the hole, and is gone. Nilbul's horror-stricken child buries his face in his mother's arms for a moment, and then they leave.

Nilbul's body falls down, and down, and down through the hole, down and down for what seems like hours upon hours, but as it falls it begins to be encapsulated by thick strands of gossamer-like material until eventually it is entirely cocooned. Still it falls, down ever further, but now, as it continues to plummet, something stirs inside the cocoon. Suddenly, a head and a long neck push forth from out of the cocoon, followed by a pair of large broad wings, and finally, having now reached the root-bearing underside of the floating island, where at last the hole opens out, a fully-formed skywhale soars forth from the hole and up into the sky, flying high above the clouds and onward through the bright sunlight of a new day, watched far away from the balcony of their hut by two silent Perlians – the widow and son of Nilbul, the erstwhile humanoid Perlian who is now a newborn airborne skywhale.

Watching this extraordinary film for the first time, I was mesmerized by its finale's completely unexpected twist, which revealed the astonishing secret of the Perlian life cycle, regarding which even the Perlians themselves seem entirely unaware. Just like here on Earth where a caterpillar eventually enters a resting phase (the chrysalis in butterflies, the cocoon in moths) during which it undergoes a dramatic metamorphosis before emerging in totally transformed state as a winged butterfly or moth, so too on Perle's floating islands does each bipedal humanoid Perlian eventually enter a cocooned resting state during which it undergoes a dramatic metamorphosis before emerging in totally transformed state as a winged skywhale.

Whether the butterfly or moth has any memory or knowledge of its prior existence as a caterpillar is unknown, but the fact that the Perlians actively hunt, kill, and consume skywhales seems to make it apparent that they have no concept that they all eventually become skywhales, that these vast aerial entities are their own future forms. So they are in a very real sense both murderers and cannibals! However, the beauty, wonder, and extremely surprising, revelatory climax to Skywhales are so captivating that such literally unappetizing contemplations as these remain mercifully unconsidered – at least they did for me! – until after the film has ended.

Skywhales is an absolutely magical, visually arresting, and highly thought-provoking mini-movie – once seen, it is rarely if ever forgotten. So if you would like to view it – and I strongly recommend that you do – be sure to click here to watch this animated masterpiece on DailyMotion (where there are also links to several additional uploads of it).

 

A couple of skywhales soaring through the misty heavens far above Perle and its floating islands in Skywhales (© Phil Austin & Derek Hayes/Animation City/Channel 4 – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

Finally: to view a complete chronological listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE, and please click HERE to view a complete fully-clickable alphabetical listing of them.

Also: I have always been fascinated by the concept of sky beasts, both in fiction and, at least putatively, in fact too.

So click here to read my review of a superb sci fi novel entitled The Wind Whales of Ishmael, set on Earth but in the far-distant future when the oceans have long since dried up and their erstwhile leviathans the whales and sharks have evolved into vast airborne beasts of the sky.

And click here to read my detailed documentation on my ShukerNature cryptozoology blog of the exceedingly thought-provoking sky beast hypothesis: i.e. that at least some UFO sightings are not of alien spacecraft as popularly believed, but are instead of exceedingly large, highly-specialised, and still-undiscovered yet bona fide native creatures that have evolved to exist exclusively in Earth's higher, rarefied, atmospheric realms far beyond normal human detection, only occasionally descending low enough to be observable by us.

In addition, I have devoted a very detailed chapter to the history and investigation of alleged sky beasts in my book Dr Shuker's Casebook: In Pursuit of Marvels and Mysteries, so be sure to check that out too.

 

My copy of the Quartet Books paperback edition, published in 1973, of The Wind Whales of Ishmael by Philip José Farmer, which was originally published in hardback in 1971; this Quartet Book's spectacular artwork is by Bob Habberfield (© Philip José Farmer/Bob Habberfield/Quartet Books – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial  Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

My book Dr Shuker's Casebook: In Pursuit of Marvels and Mysteries, featuring a couple of sky medusae on its front cover, created by Philippa Foster (© Dr Karl Shuker/Philippa Foster/CFZ Press - reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)