N.B. The following review contains no spoilers, so you may read it without learning anything about the plot that will distract from your initial viewing.
I took in a matinée showing of Cloverfield this afternoon. One of the nice things about living in Iowa is the fact that a matinée costs only $4.00, about a third of what a regular priced ticket goes for in Massachusetts.
I went to see the film in part because I love a good sci–fi horror film.1 Having seen Alien vs. Predator: Requiem last week — which was almost as bad as the first Alien vs. Predator film — I was hoping for more from Cloverfield.2 Like Chris Heard, however, I also went to see it because I knew they would be showing a trailer for the forthcoming Star Trek film.
Cloverfield does not disappoint. It has elements from the classic sci–fi horror genre, particularly the Godzilla films and War of the Worlds. Like the latter, it is told from the point of view of a civilian who is only seeing part of the larger picture.3 You never fully find out what is going on or the origins of whatever is terrorizing the city, and there are things that happen to some of the characters that are never fully explained due to the fog of war.
Unlike a lot of sci–fi horror, Cloverfield does not depend on things jumping out at you unexpectedly. I have always found that to be a rather amateurish way of scaring the audience, and Cloverfield makes only minor use of it. The plot moves nicely from action sequences to scenes focused only on the human characters. The director recognizes something that horror films often overlook: the audience needs to care about the characters. Alien vs. Predator: Requiem centers around too many human characters, so you never connect with any of them. When the aliens catch up with them, you don’t care if they live or die (which is good, because you know they are going to die in fun ways). In Cloverfield, we see enough of the main characters to develop an attachment. They come across as fully developed people instead of cannon fodder.
One slightly bothersome yet critical aspect of the film is that it is set up to be video footage taken by one of the main characters. This vomit–inducing cinematography — popularized by The Blair Witch Project — made me a bit leery of the film. It turned out not to be as distracting as I feared. In some ways, it serves as a commentary on our wired lives in which everything has to be documented on video. The director (J.J. Abrams of Lost and Alias) is obviously aware of this. In a wonderfully done scene, when the Whatever–The–Hell–It–Is tosses the head of the Statue of Liberty down the street,4 the people do not turn and run away. Instead, a multitude of them pull out their cell phones and began taking pictures of the head. This and a few other humorous moment are scattered throughout the film, and elevate what could have been a B+ monster movie to A– status.
- I don’t really care for non–sci–fi horror, with the exception of the Silence of the Lambs films. [back]
- One problem I had with the Alien vs. Predator movies was that is was a combination of two series: Alien, which I liked, and Predator, which I didn’t. Because of this, I kept wanting the Aliens to win, even though the film is set up in such a way that you are supposed to be rooting for the Predator. [back]
- In fact, it is a more fitting tribute to that style of storytelling than Tom Cruise’s mediocre remake of War of the Worlds. [back]
- A tribute to Escape from New York. [back]