Nerdery

When I saw the teaser for Cloverfield, I was intrigued.  What was this movie?  What’s going on?  I did a little digging and found that it was monster movie.

I love monster movies.  When I was a kid, my friends and I would watch Godzilla movies and smash cities we’d made out of toy blocks or Legos. I love monster movies so much, I made the mistake of watching Godzilla– yes, that one– ten years ago.

A monster movie from the creator of Lost and Drew Goddard?  I was sold.

I managed to get passes to an advance screening.  Christina wasn’t terribly eager to see the film.  She couldn’t make it through the Blair Witch Project without getting nauseous, so Cloverfield’s home video style wasn’t going to sit well with her.

Just our luck, the theatre filled up before we got in.

I never got the chance to see it in theatres, but, we were out the other day and I saw the DVD and picked it up.

The movie is presented as found footage, recovered by the U.S. Government after the incident in New York City.  Until the closing credits roll, the film doesn’t break that premise.  This means there’s no score.  Only source music.

The footage begins a month before the main events.  We’re introduced to Rob and Beth, two of our protagonists, before the footage jumps to the preparation for Rob’s going away party.  The jumps and cuts can be a little confusing at first.  The flashbacks are pieced in as if the camera were malfunctioning or otherwise not recording.  It’s an effective technique, giving you some background without breaking the realism of the footage.

The first fifteen or twenty minutes of the movie are devoted to introducing the characters and giving you a feel for its style.

Then it hits the fan.

I don’t really want to summarize the plot, mostly because a lot of reviews are nothing more than a summary with a brief opinion at at the end, and that’s always bugged me.

I really liked that you never really got a good look at the monster (dubbed Clover in the bonus materials) until the end of the movie.  You catch glimpses between buildings or on a television news report, but nothing more.

I also liked the overall style of the movie.  A lot of people are put off by the amateur look and shaky camerawork and I understand that.  It’s not something you see a lot of in Hollywood.  There’s the Blair Witch Project and Firefly (and Serenity) and that’s about it.  This isn’t a documentary-style film– it’s a tape that was “found.”  It’s messy and choppy and you can’t always see everything what you want.  And that’s fun to me.

(I got into broadcasting and film when my elementary school built a studio when I was in fifth grade.  Why the school needed one, I don’t know.  I was in every broadcasting class offered until I graduated high school.  I figure that’s why I’m not bothered by camera movement.)

The effects are pretty impressive.  Despite this, it’s still a little weird when you finally get a good look at Clover.  I don’t think that’s anything wrong with the CGI, you just aren’t really expecting it and there’s nothing else like it in the movie.

The dialogue is wonderful.  I’m a sucker for realistic, clever dialogue and former Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel and current Lost writer Drew Goddard’s script has plenty of it.  The actors were also encouraged to improvise lines (indeed, the party scene is mostly improv) which helps make the dialogue that much more convincing.

I have to give actress Lizzy Caplan some quick praise.  She really stands out in an otherwise generic-looking cast.  That’s really the only problem I have with the movie.  The cast is a little too pretty and bland.  They’re all solid actors, but I would have liked a bit more variety.

The special features are fairly informative.  There’s a handful of deleted scenes and two alternate endings to go along with the behind-the-scenes features and blooper reel.  I’m not sure the ending they went with was the strongest, but director Matt Reeves explains why it was chosen and it makes sense.

Reeves handles the commentary solo, which is dry, but still full information.  I’d have preferred Goddard or J.J. Abrams in there with him, just to get a different perspective, but Reeves does a serviceable job.

Plus, how does he reference Alias and Felicity (a lot) and Mission Impossible 3 but not a single mention of Lost?

The movie gets 4/5 stars and the DVD manages three.  It could be better, but there’s talk of a sequel (which I wouldn’t mind) so maybe we’ll get a “special edition” when that hits.