Rating:

I just saw Cloverfield with my buddy Zach and all I have to say is WOW!

Well, that’s not all I have to say. Here’s a run-down of my thoughts:

1) It’s amazing how little character business you really need in a script. Within the first ten minutes all the major characters are introduced and, more importantly, all their relationships are made perfectly clear, including a very sincere romantic relationship that forms the backbone of the story. It only takes one really well done scene to convince the viewer of real love between the characters.

2) The filmmakers make a respectable effort to convince the audience that a jackass would still be running around filming all this with a little video camera. While I think the context of the story does make this more believable than in The Blair Witch Project, it is, unfortunately, still totally ridiculous and did pull me out of the story a couple of times (why is that guy still filming this?). Even though the camera-element turns out to be a very important part of the story, and in that respect is used beautifully, I think it would have just been better to either have the story told through someone’s eyes (literal POV) or just to forego all that and still film it the same way as a disembodied camera. The film would still be completely engrossing, regardless.

3) It’s remarkable how “real” the story is. That is to say, nearly all of the plot feels organic and unconstructed. Of course they’d run there. Of course he’d do that. The problem is that about half way through the story there’s a sequence involving some buildings (one partially collapsed) that feels completely fake and “written”; it’s clear that there was a conscious decision to have this sequence in the film to liven up the story. Had the rest of the film not been so wonderfully realistic I don’t think this particular sequence would bother me, but given how mesmerizing other parts of the story are I couldn’t help but groan a little when this come around.

4) Zach and I also saw 28 Weaks Later (that spelling is deliberate) and one of my remarks for that film had been that were there to be a catastrophic viral outbreak in England that I find it inconceivable that the U.S. government, with or without U.N. approval or support, wouldn’t declare England lost and nuke the hell out of it (or at the very least fire-bomb it into ash). Thankfully, the military’s response in Cloverfield — with little regard for collateral damage — is exactly what I would expect, and is exactly what I would hope they’d behave in a situation like this.

5) Plan to go to a bar after the movie. Zach had to take off — probably to deal with that wife of his — but I could have talked about the this movie for hours. You have to ask, “What would you do in a situation like this?” Cloverfield makes for an excellent precursor to chicken wings and beer.

6) Finally, the monster is awesome. This isn’t like the trailer where you’re not getting to see this thing; the filmmakers put it out there and you see a lot more of it than you probably even want to. The design of it is interesting, but as I think a couple reviews have mentioned this film isn’t about the monster in the same way Godzilla is. This film is about what the monster’s doing to us, and it is horrifying. I don’t think it’s possible to walk out of this movie rooting for the monster; it is, unquestionably, the villain of the film.

If the opportunity presents itself to see this flick again I’d probably take it. It’s really something else. I’m not sure I could watch another monster movie that doesn’t employ the same on-the-ground/personal perspective that this film does. Cloverfield makes all other monster movies seem trivial by comparison.