Solid, entertaining, bone-chilling thriller... even if you scraped that tacked-on ending away.

Rating: 9/10 (17 February 2018)

I know nothing about the Cloverfield franchise - and I had no interest in it before - but I recently heard that JJ Abrams has a habit of attaching the franchise to 2 random indie films to expand on the "lore". One of them is good, one of them is not. So this peaked my interest on what all the fuss is for Cloverfield and why everyone was watching its "blood-relatives". So I'm watching them in non-chronological order.
But how was 10 Cloverfield Lane? If it weren't for that stupid last 10 minutes, it's actually fantastic. It's claustrophobic, suspenseful, smart, well-crafted, and reveals many plot points with more elegance than the average horror film. The performances are great, the built-up tension is excellent, the sound-design creepy, the characters are interesting, and the villain is horrifying. At times he seems sympathetic, kind, and charming, but other times a murderous, mentally-disturbed old guy that couldn't be played better by anyone else but John Goodman. It's best if you go in with no expectations or knowledge of the plot to let the clever script toy with your emotions more.
But that doesn't mean you'll get a modern masterpiece. Some moments felt like they dragged on longer than they should and the silly ending loses a lot of tension. All the praise I've gushed about was apparent for most of the film, but at the very end producer JJ Abrams let the filmmakers reshoot a few scenes to let the Cloverfield lore shoved in in the most unsubtle way possible. It doesn't ruin the film, but it DID ruin a few scenes that were building up to something only to forget why it was even there. I'm not entirely sure if changing the ending will still make the film a flawless one as it does feel 15 minutes too long, but it wouldn't suddenly shift to sci-fi.
It's still a solid, entertaining, and bone-chilling thriller that had the potential to be great but ended up being really good. If you have the weird Cloverfield interest that I have now, go watch. If you're not interested in Cloverfield, go watch. If you're a fan of Scott Pilgrim, then Ramona is the main lead. So... go watch!