-SPOILER WARNING-
Ok so... I know I told some people that I was going to write a review on this movie a long time ago... and I didn't lie... it just took me a while. Sorry about that. Anyway...
So I went to see "Cloverfield" shortly after it opened. I'd seen the previews for this movie and I was really excited about it! It looked sweet. The CGI looked amazing and the movie just looked like it was going to be sweet! I heard some different rumors about what the monster was leading up to the movie... and I was almost hoping that if it was simply just a monster, that it was going to a new Godzilla flick. All that to say, I walked into the theater with pretty high expectations for this movie. After about the first ten minutes I began to have doubts, and by the end I was extremely disappointed in this movie. First of all, the back story of the movie is that the government has found a tape recording the incident of the attack and is playing it for the public. The video the government supposedly found was there because a guy was videotaping his friends going away party while the attack happened and he left the camera on. All that to say, the entire movie was filmed from a single hand held camera. As the characters run, jump, hide, and climb throughout NYC one of them is holding this camera. There were literally times I had to look away from the screen to avoid getting motion sickness... I really liked the idea of the single hand held camera but it was simply too much.
My second beef with this movie was the motive of the monster... Why was it attacking? Why then? Why NYC? To may loose ends.
Third, what was it? It wasn't Godzilla. It kinda looked like an alien lobster... anybody know what it was supposed to be?
Fourth... the ending was terrible... those of you who've seen it know what I'm saying, maybe you disagree, but I think it was terrible. I'll just say it was kinda like "A Perfect Storm" on steroids.
In summary, it seemed to me that "Cloverfield" was basically people who had this good, original idea, and rushed to get it out there without really thinking about it and developing a good story.
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8 comments:
Hmm... interesting, Joseph. I like knowing why you didn't like the movie... and I understand your viewpoint to a degree. I definitely disagree as a whole, though.
Personally, the shaky camera work didn't bother me one bit. I also know that some people literally got sick in the theater when they saw it. If they hadn't used the hand held camera, though, I don't know how I would've liked the movie. It looked like a real documentation of the events, which is what it was supposed to be. So, sure, you don't have to like that... but it was definitely an important "effect" of the movie.
As far as motives of the monster go, why do you have to know everything? The fact that every detail isn't laid out for you and you have to think (and look at the clues in the movie, which there were) to figure things out shouldn't make you hate a movie. Think about this and maybe it'll help answer some of the questions you have... the first thing you see blowing up was that oil rig thing. What was it doing in the water? Digging. Where'd the monster come from? The water. It would be safe, in my opinion, to piece together that the oil rig thing might have provoked the monster unintentionally causing it to attack. Why NYC? That's what was right there. If you're an agitated monster, you attack what bothered you.
What the monster's supposed to be isn't really said. I've heard it was supposed to be a young one of whatever it actually was. It reminded me of an alien-cracken-spider-squid mix. But again, does the audience really need to know what exactly it was? That wasn't the point of the movie. In fact, you could say that the fact that there were no definitve answers as to what it was made the movie that much more powerful and added an extra element of horror. Fear of the unknown...
What didn't you like about the ending? Was it just that you still had questions (cause by know I think you know that I don't see that as a good reason. =P) at the end? Personally, the ending made it for me. The characters in the movie were easy to get attached to because of how "real" the footage was in terms of what you saw of everyone. So when the end happens, you're on edge and if you're like me, you've got major chills. I especially loved that last tiny scene on the ferris wheel. "I had a good day." That was genius, right there.
I don't think the problem of the film was laziness, which seems to be what you've decided. I can assure you that JJ Abrams did not rush through it and had (has) a plan. This is just "how he works" if you will. There's always that element of mystery, that search for answers... he doesn't want to spoon feed audiences, he wants to keep them on edge and make them figure things out (or at least give them a chance to) before the big reveal. And sure, sometimes it's more effective than others, depending on how much hype you personally get and what he's had planned all along. But the plan is there, all the same.
And since they've announced there'll be a sequel anyway, you'll probably get closer to your answers then. You'll just have to wait until 2009 to get them. ;) [source: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0009190/]
Thanks for sharing your thoughts... hope mine don't bug you too much. =P It's always good to hear what other people are thinking. ^_^
heh... sorry that was like a book. =P
I loved the ending. I thought it was perfect. And It's completely JJ's style to have questions at the end, and having to put together pieces on your own apart from the movie/show by itself. I guess that's just an acquired taste. I liked KK's post, so I'll just add this as far as backstory of the monster goes:
At the end, when the two characters are on the faris wheel you can see something falling out of the sky behind them and landing in the water. Websites made in regards to the movie (such as 1-18-08.com, etc) were created in advance (kinda like all the Dark Knight sites) and one of them was a company that reported a satalite falling into the harbor there. Here's an excerpt from a post I saw elsewhere online:
"Third: the monster, as far as where it comes from- clues have been dropped all over the place through viral advertising. JJ Abrams created myspaces of some of the main characters in the film, plus company websites for a company called Taraguto and Slusho (which is owned by taraguto). Taraguto does deep sea oil drilling and slusho is a drink made from 'deep sea nectar'. characters drink slusho in the beginning of the movie and a character has a slusho shirt... the monster has lived under the sea(directly from Abrams) and was evidently disturbed by Taraguto's drilling.
Fourth, a piece of one of their satelites fell into the atlantic ocean (reported on the fake taraguto website) ... watch closely and you can catch the satelite fall in the background in the last scene of Rob and Beth at Coney Island saying goodbye to the camera.
And last but not least, after the credits the audio clip says "It's still alive." See for yourself -- http://boomp3.com/m/bd034dfca370 "
i see your points and that does clear things up a bit but a couple defenses of my points... lol. first in response to jessica's comment about the websites for the backstory. that is a cool idea... to have such a wider "story" than what you see in the movie. but at the same time i don't want to have to do research before i go see a movie. i've always believed that dramatic films are created for entertainment, and to me it takes away from the entertainment if i have to do a bunch of research to understand the movie.
i'm glad to hear that there will be a sequel. as much as i disliked the first movie i will probably have to see that just to figure more things out. lol.
also, i don't want you to misunderstand me on these three points. i love the idea of the whole handheld camera "actual documentation" thing. it just became to much. like they needed to have more scenes where they were standing still or something. i don't know. also, i don't really think that they rushed this movie out, that's just the impression i got after watching it. third, i love movies that kinda leave you hanging at the end, this movie just seemed to have too many loose ends... but the fact that there will be a sequel helps with that a lot... any more thoughts? : )
I don't think that the available backstory online in necessary for the movie, that one *has* to find it to enjoy the movie. I just think it's cool that it is out there for those interested enough to look. You don't have to research it. That's not the point.
I loved the end. I don't want a sequel. Boo on that. haha
lol. agreed on the first part... the second part... a little too many loose ends lol.
Yeah... the sequel's kind of an iffy thing for me. I don't want it to ruin Cloverfield, but I think they can do it well. We'll see later. =)
As far as additional comments go... *reviews* Not much else to add since I wrote so much to begin with, but... one more thing. Then I'm done. lol =)
If they added more 'sit still' scenes, I think it would've detracted from the suspense. It just seems hard to me to be able to make something like that shooting style balanced, I guess you could call it, just because it is so subjective. It might make Joe So-and-So throw up, you might have to look away a few times, and I may be just fine. It's hard to gauge that for such a wide audience.
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