Cloverfield Review

Surprising I hadn’t heard of Cloverfield until very recently. I had somehow managed to avoid the viral advertising and the speculation that inevitably rose from it. This is hugely beneficial from the point of a review, as I’m completely unbiased to the film.Cloverfield has been described as “a cross between: Godzilla, 9/11 and the Blair-witch project” by quite a few of my friends. In theory this could make the best action movie ever, it could be the most jaw-dropping and cinematically shallow production ever created. Indeed it could even be good.

The film opens with the sound of the monsters footsteps getting closer, and then quickly moves onto telling us that the footage that we’re about to be shown was found in the area formerly known as central park. I do have a minor problem with this already, if the footage was found in the area formerly known as central park, and the military or whatever know that the area was central park, why isn’t it still called central park?

We are then treated to the first camera work featured in the film, which is truly difficult to watch. Indeed it’s so bad that three people leave the cinema and never return. In this footage we are introduced to Rob and his girlfriend Beth, who are both jackasses who I don’t care about.

The film then cuts to Rob’s surprise goodbye party, where we are gradual introduced to some more jackasses who I don’t care about, including the man who will be filming the rest of the film, Hud. Hud’s defining characteristics are that he says dude a lot, screams “Oh my god!” whenever anything happens and films everything badly, much like everyone else in the film.

After we’re introduced to Hud, we get to meet more jackasses, who are all identical and who incidentally I DON’T CARE ABOUT! It is then revealed that Beth has broken up with Rob ‘cause she’s a bitch, she leaves and the film continues along on its horribly boring path. I wouldn’t mind if these sequences didn’t take up a third of the films runtime and the camera wasn’t practically thrown around all the time.

After 30 minutes of quite possibly unscripted behaviour, we hear a really, really loud bang and all the lights go out. I sit up out of my cocoon of despair, take care to notice that another 4 people have left and begin to watch the film. Our “heroes” and begin to watch the film. Our “heroes” make their way up to the roof, and watch the gigantic explosion in the distance. Wait a minute, the monster explodes?

Anyway the explosion sends rubble scattering everywhere, which would be quite frankly boring if it wasn’t filmed this way, but when filmed this ways it’s... mundane. Seriously is this all the film has? I was expecting something that would keep me on the edge of my seat, but I’ve watched about a third of this and I feel like I’ve been here for days.Anyway our heroes run down onto the street, which considering that the roofs are blowing up is probably not too bad an idea, actually it’s the most intelligent things our heroes have done so far, and I wouldn’t keep your hopes up for later on...

When our heroes finally make it onto the street, they stand around and film stuff, that is until the statue of liberty’s head almost crushes them! Alright I admit it that was impressive, but it’s got to be a high point right?

Anyway after this occurrence our heroes stand around and film stuff again... Oh and there’s a little bit of cultural irony here, Hud films a film of the head! The irony of it all! I hate Abrams (the director, apparently, although I really don’t think he did anything at all) now. More people leave the cinema, I don’t because I’ve seen worse.

Did I mention the huge clouds of billowing smoke in the sky, probably coming from the exploding thingies? It’s all very 9/11ish and it’s full of subtext which doesn’t really mean anything. To be totally honest I’m not even sure Abrams knows what subtext is, this is the man who created Lost a television show so stupid that it features polar bears on a tropical island, in fact on second thought I’m not even sure Abrams knows what 9/11 is.

Anyway the “plot” continues on as our “heroes” attempt to get out of New York via the bridge, which destroyed by a gigantic tail, which looks quite cool and for some reason makes the main character decide to go and get Beth back, which makes absolutely no sense. The cinema is almost empty me, my friends and few similar groups are all that remain.

The “characters” then try to get to Beth’s apartment, and to cut a long story short Cloverfield results in the most action packed, and tense monster movie ever filmed, all due to the camera gimmick. Cloverfield has millions of problems the most glaring of these are that: · It means nothing.· It’s not acted.· The film avoids doling out horror movie stereotypes by making all the characters the same person.· It’s not scripted.Yet despite all this Cloverfield is still the best monster movie ever. It’s tense, surprisingly dramatic, quite scary, and actually very mysterious.

6/10 (Note: Possibly a 7 if you don’t give a shit about subtext.)

P.S. [SPOILER] For all of you who want the end of the story told from my perspective, and speculations for the sequel, look down.·

Plot ending: All the annoying wankers die, and the monster escapes, all in all a really happy ending.·

Sequel: Not much else happens, J.J.Abrams pretends to understand politics, and there might be polar bears in New York. Who knows? More to the point who cares anymore?