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| Release Date: | January 18, 2008 (US), February 1, 2008 (UK) |
| Runtime: | 85 min |
| Rated: | Rated PG-13 for violence, terror and disturbing images. |
| Genres: | Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller |
| Directed by: | Matt Reeves |
| Written by: | Drew Goddard |
| Starring: | Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, T.J. Miller, Michael Stahl-David, Mike Vogel, Odette Yustman |
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 Rented Cloverfield (which now finishing watching it, still have no fucking clue why its called that) and thought it was almost there but left so much more to be desired. When a movie is overhyped online and on television, you better have the piñata to back up the fiesta. Good news though, it still isn’t half as bad as the Roland Emmerich Godzilla remake.
If you haven’t seen any of the gobs of ads they broadcasted a year in advance to this movie, then don’t; because, if you do, you’re going to be sorely disappointed after watching the movie. The trailer looks awesome and pretty much doesn’t tell you anything. You see the Statue of Liberty’s head flying through the streets of New York after some big explosions and a bunch of partiers running amuck. I thought it was a brilliant teaser.
The movie is basically a longer version of the trailer but boring. You have a love story intertwined between two of the main characters and a lot of bad camera action. The movie in fact is 100% shaky hand camera that does get nauseating at times. If you rent this, you can safely fast forward the first 30 minutes of jibber jab at the most boring party I’ve ever had to watch on celluloid. The meat of the film is the monster and the havoc that pursues.
First off, they showed the monster a whole lot more than I was expecting, so that was good. However, it still wasn't good enough. The main shots are crappy obstructed flybys or out of focus shaky cam work. You see a lot of the little monsters that fall from the big one’s stomach (or whatever) but they’re nothing more than giant insect things. Next, the monster isn't too frightening looking (in fact, in the bonus feature they said it was supposed to be a child? WTF?) I would’ve rather had this be another shot at Godzilla but we got his redheaded step child. By the way, they don’t explain anything at all about the monster which I found to be the most imaginative aspect to the storyline. For once, the government doesn’t have secret hidden files on the creature and Jeff Goldblum can’t hack into its brain using Windows 95.
Anyhoo, the character building was pretty annoying at the beginning and, once again, no one has balls anymore. I'm sick of these semi heroic protagonists in movies. I want a guy that pulls his shit together in a tough situation and puts his balls out there. These characters are not action material despite the fact that this was supposed to look uber-realistic (Blair Witchesque). Speaking of the Blair Witch aspect, it is not realistic by any scope; natural shot movies don’t get lighting like this, nor sound, nor people with such good complexions. If they want to do a realistic movie, do one on a shitty Panasonic handheld with poor sound and ugly people without makeup on.
Overall, Cloverfield offers a few good action moments of a monster destroying Manhattan, a few funny parts supplied by the cameraman, and a whole lot of unanswered questions. This movie was like your girlfriend promising hot dirty sex and instead giving you a striptease and falling asleep. |
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