Review"Look, all I'm saying is that this thing coulda have come from anywhere! It could have come from outer space!" - HudShort and altogether unnecessary autobiographic paragraph here, skip to the next one if you want to, you won’t be missing much. Initially I had high hopes for Cloverfield when it was announced. J J Abrams, the dude behind Lost, was the mastermind behind the project and the studio was promising a whole new cinema experience. By the time the studio’s marketing team had got around to informing the movie-watching community that yes in fact the film’s title was Cloverfield I was overly bored with the whole thing and had it pegged as another marketing project set up to shill the rubes. When they announced the PG13 rating, well that was the end of any goodwill I felt toward the flick; giant monster attacking your city, for sure I wouldn’t be dropping the occasional “F” word. Hence the long time between film release and review. I actually got around to watching what is euphemistically called a movie on DVD, and am frankly appalled that once again a Studio has got away with stretching a half hour idea to movie length and doing it in the cheapest way possible. Well at least they weren’t claiming this one actually happened as the BWP people did, and surprisingly people actually believed that schlock, proving that one is born every minute. Of course we did have a lot of fun watching via the interweb people trying to catch their 15 minutes with various theories about what Cloverfield was about and what the monster would be. Naturally 99% of this speculation proved incorrect – Godzilla, really? The studio got the rights? All this did was resolve that Harry Knowles could produce a review before a movie was released that clearly indicated he hadn't actually seen the movie, morally bankrupt comes to mind. Wish I had that sort of ESP ability, hey the new Will Smith flick Hancock rocks, and it’s either going to be the best movie you will see all year or the worst. To cut various long stories short, excellent marketing by the Studio that fooled the usual suspects into supporting a pretty much crap movie. Lets get it on, bang a gong. A surprise party for yuppie Rob, who is taking up a position of VP in charge of bum-licking or something in Japan, is disrupted by a large explosion in downtown New York City. I wasn’t putting this past being a Dennis Rodman publicity stunt but the flying head of the Statue of Liberty kind of put paid to that. By the way, shouldn’t that head be somewhat bigger? Turns out NYC is under attack by a giant unexplained monster intent on doing maximum damage for no apparent reason. Rob, his bro and girlfriend, hanger-on Marlene, and brain-dead cameraman Hud are soon fleeing through the streets to supposed safety via a bridge (New Yorkers to identify there). Rob receives a phone call from some chick he slept with eight months earlier, and decides to head back across Manhattan to rescue her, which by the way results in multiple fatalities. The huge monster isn’t the only thing our band of would-be rescuers have to deal with, there’s also smaller parasitic monsters, head explosions, and the military going all major firepower on us. Another cheaply-made and overly-marketed movie ensues. Cloverfield has exactly four scenes in the whole movie that lead anywhere, the rest is filler. We have the initial monster attack, the subway scene, the rescue of Rob’s ex fling, and the final confrontation. The rest of the film involves self-indulgent yanks running around yelling at each other, oh and filming everything to ensure they have something to throw on YouTube. I guess a Cloverfield apologist could argue that this is a statement on modern America’s electronic media focused obsession – how else do you explain reality TV? – but for mine that would be giving the scriptwriters and Director way too much credit. You can even read subtext into various William Castle epics, it’s easy enough to do and generally gives way too much credit to industry hacks. Moving along, whether or not the dialogue involved in the filler crap was ad-libbed is up for debate, I certainly hope it was because it brings new meaning to inane. Let’s face facts, only Harold Pinter has ever really managed to get away with making the mundane of any interest. Oops, forgot about that PG13 rating, can’t have an extra slipping up and mouthing an f-bomb. Dear God in heaven this means someone wrote this crud, proof positive kids that anyone can be a Hollywood studio scriptwriter. Where the movie really fails, and let’s face facts here we have ample room to point out the failures involved, is with the lead characters. Are we meant to identify with these morons? Worry about how they will make it to the end credits? Give a crap about any of them? Be concerned they are wearing fresh undies? All four lead characters come across as irritating in the extreme, and the audience simply won’t care what happens to them. They should have thrown the cast of Friends in here, at least we would of had a couple of actors who could, you know, act a bit. Now I know that would have stretched the premise in Cloverfield, all about reality don’t you know, and involving the audience as the main characters and script proceed to do the most unrealistic things possible. Without dialling into the hundred and one other issues with this monstrosity, no pun intended, of a movie, a couple of plot holes you could drive a giant monster through, pun intended. Rob and his band of whingers – do all Americas moan and whinge this much? – travel all across what I guess is Manhattan, and wouldn’t you know it but the giant monster seems to be constantly hot on their heels. It’s like they have a monster attraction device or something going down. Let’s be honest here, any other movie that wasn’t considered in some fanboy alternative reality as “art” would have been hung, drawn, and quartered over that development. Throughout the film it’s like the monster has a personal vendetta against Rob’s merry band of yuppie posers, guess it got irritated by them as well. Rob’s ex love-interest, who has spent quite some time in a semi-collapsed building with an iron support through her chest and quite possibly should be the victim of a punctured lung, once freed is within minutes bounding down deserted streets like a gazelle. Talk about your urban commando unit! This being a PG13 wank fest for the horror-lite crowd, there is of course no blood and, oh I don’t know, actual friggin injuries involved on screen. Sorry, metal spike through chest, you aren’t going anywhere soon amigo, and for sure you won’t be ready to get down and do the funky chicken for a while. So I did actually find a couple of things working for the film, who would have thought it. The CGI was pretty good and you couldn’t see the seams where the effects were sown onto the actual movie. Guess that’s where all the production cost went. And the subway scene was effective, especially when we find someone losing their head over it (hehehehehe). Other than that I thought the movie was pretty standard “B” grade monster fare, and no am not buying into the bollocking about the audience being right in the movie due to the hand held camera work, there were simply too many things going wrong for that to work. On the acting side, well no-one in this cast of unknowns is ever likely to threaten on Oscar night, or get a major role in a genuine movie to be honest. Pretty standard acting school, will work cheap, hey it’s better than being on the crew down MacDonald’s stuff. Lizzy Caplan (Marlene) was at least effective in convincing the audience she would rather have an in-depth relationship with her mobile phone than spend five minutes talking to Hud. Zero on the T&A front kids, sorry to be the bringer of bad tidings, but nothing is going to get in the way of that PG13 rating which was the only chance this movie had of actually turning a profit. Since this is all hand held reality sort of stuff, the score is next to non-existent. Which probably works out as a bonus for the long suffering audience, and of course saved the studio a buck or two. So that is at least a win-win situation for everyone. So I finally got around to catching Cloverfield and have to say it’s a lot worse than I expected it to be. This is cheap moviemaking, wrapped up in a massive advertising blitz, pretending not to be a “B” grade horror outing. I found all the leads irritating, the movie failed to drag me into the plot, and Rob’s decision to head back across Manhattan inane in the extreme. A better scriptwriter may have been able to get Rob’s decision working for the audience, but we didn’t have one so the point is moot. If this had been a “B” grader I found in the bargain bin I would still not be happy; they didn’t even try beyond the advertising campaign with this movie. End of day, another cynical move by a Studio to separate the rubes from their pocket money. Damn, add me to that category as well; I spent cash on the DVD proving once and for all that I suck. Cloverfield was expected to be the first big movie of 2008, and a reboot for the horror genre into the bargain. The movie opened heavily in all markets and then collapsed to around a 2 x multiplier as word got out just how bad it was. Downunder I Am Legend proved to be the kick-start the year needed and the Country followed North America’s example in dumping Cloverfield after the first weekend. Interestingly enough, apologists are still claiming -60% drops week in week out proves good word of mouth. At best Cloverfield suffered front-end load, at worst terrible word of mouth – your call on that one. A total of $80 million plus in North America and $5 million plus in Australia is not to be sneezed at given the genre, but woefully disappointing given the comparative opening weekends. Am half expecting the sequel, and dear God we will get one, to tank completely ala Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. No recommendation on Cloverfield, watch at your own risk. The movie is poorly made, has no redeeming features, and is only of interest to those who like to watch things go boom. Don’t get fooled by the hype, Cloverfield is simply another marketing ploy from a Studio that has a pretty piss poor product on their hands but figure if they create the right buzz then the great unwashed won’t care. Save your money and go watch one of the Godzilla DVDs instead, you won’t exactly be rolling in clover with this one.
ScaryMinds Rates this movie as ... Token black people threatened by giant monster advert as well.
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