Superb, taut thriller spoilt by ending

Rating: 8/10 (12 July 2016)

OK, I've given this 8/10 and yet will criticise a part of this movie that many will feel is the most critical part. There is logic there though, so bear with me...
I saw Cloverfield years ago. It was an okay-film if I remember, with an absurdly long and poorly acted first act. I never had the urge to watch again, so went into this one with more trepidation than anything.
I was wholly wrong. The film was outstanding. What developed through about 95% of the running time was a taut, suspenseful thriller with some great acting and a plot which was subtle and kept you wondering about peoples motivations.
John Goodman is great in this, being homely and creepy in one bundle. The girl is too resourceful to be completely believable but these are extreme situations so this can be overlooked. Her captive companion works well as a device to make you re-question Goodman's motivations.
If someone came into this film on the basis of loving the original Monster-themed movie they would be hugely disappointed. This had echo's of other films or TV shows - Misery for one, Wayward Pines too. But no monsters, aliens or found footage to be seen.
At the end of her captivity, the horrifying realisation that everything outside the bunker is 'normal' is palpable given the preceding carnage. Standing on the truck and then realising that all is not as it seems as in the distance a flying craft that doesn't look vaguely terrestrial start flying towards her, is quite a shock moment and subtly done.
If the credits had rolled at this very point this movie would have scored a 10. All the questions about Goodman's character would have been flopping around in your mind whilst realising that her fatal mistake had been picking a worse fate over a potentially bad one. You would have left with that desire to hop on CTDB and see what the various theories were.
But then we are treated to a final few minutes of ridiculous CGI alien attack, where the female lead suddenly turns into an all-action alien-ship destroyer armed only with a bottle of scotch, a lighter and a fantastically aimed powerful throw.
We simply didn't need this. We didn't need to know that there were various camps for survivors. We didn't need to have a hard-to-follow CGI workout at the end of this movie.
So instead of leaving talking about all the what-if's, we are talking about how poor the ending was. So this is a movie where less really would have been more, and having the ending we did was bitterly disappointing.
We don't need whooping-and-a-hollering action sequences to leave a lasting impression. The Mist was a similarly taut film (more in the horror mould) with a downbeat ending which was more horrifying that an explosive action sequence could ever deliver.
So why the '8' rating? Well I still think the movie stands on it's own right up until the big alien reveal, and if you are prepared to turn off at this point, or disregard the following few minutes then you are left with an amazingly gripping thriller which stays in the memory for the right reasons.
I'd certainly recommend others watch this, as long as the expectation is that this ISN'T a monster movie in the vein of the original.