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Movie Review: Cloverfield- War of the Blair Witches
01/18/08
First, I'd like to say that whatever model camera that was, I'm getting one. That tape lasted one and half hours of movie time and God knows how much actual time. Even at LP mode, incredible. And, the battery life? Whew!
OK, on to the movie. Cloverfield can best be described as a synthesis of the Blair Witch Project and War of the Worlds. It has an unstoppable giant monster and Rob Hawkins (Michael Stahl-David) has to save his girlfriend, Beth (Odette Yustman). Scratch that. He doesn't really have to. As incredibly attractive as Beth is, when you see what Rob has to endure, it's hard to believe that somebody would feel obligated to make that effort to rescue a girl he spent one night with(!). I mean, at least Leonardo di Caprio got to paint a picture. I'm thinking he could have let her go and walked away with a clear conscience, but that's just me. And, that's about it for the plot. It's like Blair Witch because, as I alluded to before, everything is filmed, quite remarkably, by one guy with a very strong forearm and an overbuilt camcorder.
The army uncovers the tape at the beginning. Clever touch. Then we have about half an hour to care about the main characters. If you don't like incredibly attractive, smart, yuppie types (some of you are and you still may not) agonizing over their latest crush while saying "dude" and "man" a lot, then you won't. I don't mind my upwardly mobile brothers and sisters, and I still didn't care that much. A little, but not like a whole lot, OK bro? I wanted the monster to come.
It did and it's a good one. As Squid Vicious on Magnasquids said, the camera work alone produces some tingly-tense moments.
A movie can't be all go-go and the comic relief comes courtesy of Hud Platt (T.J. Miller) who manages to keep acting like a clueless frat boy throughout the disaster and Marlena (Lizzy Caplan) who lets us know what Janeane Garofalo would be like if Garofalo were forty seven times more attractive and half as annoying. The humor seems cheap.
The ending is "B-witching."
I'm of mixed mind as to the overall effect of the Cloverfield. The thread bare plot and lack of exposition, opposite of the gabby Golden Compass, lends itself to the style, but I sometimes felt that the whole thing was kind of gimmicky. I'm OK with it, though. Maybe there should be a faux-documentary/thriller every ten years or so (but that's it).
Some things that even one as credulous as I couldn't swallow:
1. A tank gets off two rounds within three seconds: Uh uh.
2. Our four intrepid heroes are in the middle of the most intense firefight I've ever seen and they experience so hearing loss: Ummm, no.
3. The incredibly resilient Jessica (Lily Ford) walks about fifty miles on heals. I've never worn them (be quiet Chris), and even I think that's pretty ridiculous.
4. In the middle of a tremendous calamity, a soldier takes time out of fighting an apocalyptic beast to escort three civilians to their certain death. I don't think so.
5. I can see snippets of the taped over footage at the beginning and the end, but the middle. What did he do: Fast forward while being attacked by a humongous alien?
Message/Politics:
Very elemental "save the girl." You have to admire the guys dedication. Other than that, pretty clean. The monster isn't a Halliburton/Prescott Bush experiment gone awry. Some of the looters are white. The Army is brusque but kind.
Two thoughts kept occurring to me: 9/11 victims, especially those trapped in the buildings, suffered throgh something similar and, people, at this very minute, are experiencing the horror of bombings and lost loved ones.
War of the Worlds (Widescreen Edition)
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