Enjoyable ride

Rating: 8/10 (16 January 2008)

It's too flippant and easy to call this Godzilla meets The Blair Witch Project. Cloverfield deserves better than that.
What it is in reality is a tense, highly enjoyable ride that (with a reasonably short runtime) never outstays its welcome. It's able to convey a tangible sense of menace that other mainstream Hollywood disaster films like ID4, the Godzilla remake and the remake of War of the Worlds couldn't, and does it without having to resort to laying on the gore.
Those who have trouble with shaky camera work and need everything in the plot tied up in a nice neat little bow need not apply to see Cloverfield. If you do, I'm sure you'll be annoyed by the films "conclusion". It feels and plays like found documentary footage so it lacks the normal structure (like Blair Witch), which is exactly the intent.
I had high hopes for this film and was completely satisfied by its end.