Terrific stuff

Rating: 9/10 (3 February 2008)

Too many of the negative comments come from people who appear to have misunderstood the idea behind the film. If you want to see a monster film showing a wider viewpoint, a clearly explained plot, and a nice neat Hollywood ending, see Godzilla (actually don't, it's cr*p), Jaws, Alien, or any one of the hundreds of such films churned out since the original King Kong. Cloverfield was always conceived as something different. The whole film is seen from the point of view of only a few people, who have no real clue what is happening and experience the mayhem first hand, filmed on their Camcorder, and as such the action is, for the audience, very realistic and believable. Echoes of Orson Welles' famous "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast are clear and the film is far superior to the rather annoying "Blair Witch Project". As in that film there is the feeling throughout that, if I were the protagonist, I'd have ditched the damn camera and run like hell within the first ten minutes - it is simply unbelievable that he would keep filming at some points. Nonetheless, a terrificly successful experiment in making something unlike any other film you've ever seen. Treat it like a theme park ride rather than Godzilla 2 and you'll be hugely impressed.