I browsing around the internets this morning and came across a few mentions of the movie Cloverfield. I vaguely remembered seeing the preview and thinking it looked interesting. But when I saw the Bad Astronomer (who seems to have a pretty good taste in movies) say it was (and I quote) AWESOME
, that was enough for me. So I woke up Xiaofen and we headed off to the theater ($5 off if you go to the 10:15AM show).
After seeing it I have to agree, I really enjoyed it and I was on the edge of my seat through the whole thing. I definitely recommend Cloverfield (in the theater if possible). Just one caveat, it’s possible the camera work might disturb anyone with motion sickness although Xiaofen didn’t have any trouble and she gets car sick all the time. I had only seen the (cryptic) trailer and didn’t have any expectations going in and I think that helped so I’m going to leave it at that and follow Wil Wheaton’s example and leave my slightly more detailed analysis in the comments.
Oh if you’re like me and worry that the director is going to stick a little extra on after the credits, there is a little something but it’s not really worth waiting for (only a couple seconds of audio and I’ll link to it below).
Possible spoilers in the comments
ScottS-M | 19-Jan-08 at 9:58 pm | Permalink
So I really liked the movie. The plot seemed pretty strong throughout. I like how I never really had any idea what was going on. I was rooting for them to get away but it would have been sort of a let down if they did so the ending was good although I did stay through the credits to see if they were going to add any extra. There’s a bit of static at the very end that I couldn’t get anything out of but apparently if you reverse it, it says “It’s still alive”.
The filming technique was unique to me (I never saw Blair Witch) and I really liked how you never got to look at the monsters. I think that’s the way to do a monster movie rather than the gratuitous CGI they’ve had recently. To me, it was a bit disappointing to see the monster in the end (but certainly not as much of a let down as in Signs).
Speaking of monsters it seems like most people are talking about two kinds of monsters; the giant indestructible monster and the little ax-killable ones. But I had actually thought there were at least two more types. First, the thing that took out the bridge looked like a big tentacle (with suckers?) and I didn’t see a tentacle on the big one. And I thought the final one in the park didn’t look big enough to be the guy that was crashing through sky scrapers. So I’d vote for 4 or more monster species myself.
The movie kept me too busy during it so I didn’t really start analyzing until afterward. But I started thinking that the references to 9/11 were a bit cheap but I think Wil makes a good point that the movie is sort of like what Godzilla was to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Sort of exploring memories through film or the director/writer’s way of dealing with it.
Anyway the movie definitely kept me entertained throughout and kept me thinking quite a while after (I even had a couple twinges as I was driving across a bridge on the way home) so it seems like that’s all you can ask for in a movie. A good flick.
ScottS-M | 19-Jan-08 at 10:04 pm | Permalink
Oh and apparently something falls in the water in the final Coney Island shot. I totally missed it.