I think we're alone now...

Rating: 9/10 (11 March 2016)

When you think about the towering forces of American character actors - or maybe when character actors just become STARS and household names - I sometimes wonder if John Goodman is someone who not necessarily gets overlooked but he isn't the one you jump to right away. Here is a man who has been in so many modern American films that can be called classics/masterpieces, but when he shows up in something that might be, you know, not quite so much (i.e. Red State) he still brings it a sense of gravitas and makes the character he plays stand out.
This might be an odd way to start a review about 10 Cloverfield Lane, but the primary reasons it works, aside from the strong writing and the surefire direction of newcomer Dan Trachtenberg (expect to see him work for a long time if all goes well), can be seen by Goodman's performance. Howard is someone who takes Michelle (also the wonderful/wide-eyed Mary Elizabeth Winstead) off from the road after an accident into an underground bunker on his farm at the address of the title. Howard admits this was his doing, for her "safety" as the air is not breathable above ground and, with only one other survivor (Emmett, played by an unrecognizable-from-The-Newsroom John Gallagher JR), have to stay until the air above and whatever "else" is there is clear... which could be years.
Goodman has no other choice than to be a force of nature, a constant threat, someone who can be trusted, not be trusted, looked at as someone who was a father, an ex-Navy man, and... may very well be a psychotic madman. In this scenario the name of the game is suspense and paranoia - the music cues that up as the great Bear McReary does his finest work yet channeling Herrmann - and the screws are constantly tightened on audiences expectations. No matter what we're with Michelle on this, but Howard is this lumbering presence, and I don't mean (simply) Goodman's girth or what have you. Psychologically he's imposing, with a voice that has that edge of "don't you TRUST me? I *saved* your life!" This can be sometimes calm, with that great heaping edge of terror, or maybe something else. The ambiguity about the situation is (and isn't) there from the end of the first act onward, but who Howard is remains something to be seen fully until the third. Oh, and sometimes he may dance a little...
Of all things, Cloverfield, the 2008 roller-coaster ride of a monster movie (slightly overrated, in my estimation, but that's just me), is not what I thought of watching this. That film lacked what this had in spades: characterization, real dread and terror, maximum stakes for people who we care about, very few (if any) hasty or stupid decisions (up until arguably the last 10 minutes, which, yes, I'll get to shortly). This reminded me more of another Abrams produced project, Lost. In that, which had many episodes taking place in a bunker setting - and also with a fellow who you couldn't really know what he was up to at first, Benjamin Linus - you had to go from one step to the next, and every moment had mystery and intrigue, but carried along on what human beings are capable of, and what happens when you realize you can't trust someone. And what if is outside is really true? Or not? What is malevolence, or control of one man over a woman or a man over a group?
Trachtenberg and the writers (including Whiplash's Damien Chazelle) have an innate love of storytelling without dialog; there is a fair amount of talking, to be sure, but not a word seems wasted when Howard talks to Michelle, or her to him, or when Michelle and Emmett become closer when Howard isn't around. Everything builds to such an intensity, and pays off with such clever and clear logic - not to mention becoming, for a few real, key moments, as much of a horror film as they can get away with (which is a lot) - that it's sort of a shame the last ten minutes are just... alright. This isn't to say they're bad, far from it, but it's when the sort of 'Cinema Sin's counter started to move a little bit as Michelle gets outside, confronts the actual menace there, and Abrams and company start to (sort of) give the "audience" that came to this movie on its name what they were expecting... which it sort of isn't.
This is as much a sequel to Cloverfield as Tarantino made a direct sequel to Django from Corbucci's 1966 film: some of the spirit of dread might be in there somewhere, but one would have to really dig into the kernels of the material to find tangible connections. It's a Twilight Zone episode stretched to feature length, but this is in the best possible way: it's a story that feeds more on what terror anyone can face any day, from the person you know, or think you know, and what danger means in a nightmare scenario like the End of the World. This means it may make those hoping for a monster-mash disappointed, but if you give it a shot you may be paid off by one of the great chamber drama-suspense films in a very long time, with Oscar-worthy performances (no, really).