Amazing movie, amazing experience, must see in theaters.

Rating: 10/10 (20 January 2008)

I am going to try and keep this as spoiler free as possible, let me start off with this, if you need a movie to spell things out for you or you're not up for doing some research on this movie, you probably will be very unsatisfied. The movie itself doesn't tell you why the monster is here, where it's from, or why it's doing what it's doing. If you watch the movie very closely there are some hints that it gives you, but even those are hard to find and still not clear as to what they are hinting. I suggest you search the internet for more info before you see this movie, interviews with the director, fake websites set up for companies in the movie that more than likely have something to do with the monster, my space pages for the characters, that will help you understand a little bit more. But once again, even after doing all of that, you still won't be positive of what is happening or why, but you will at least have more information to draw your own conclusion. Now for the actual movie review :) I had very high expectations for this movie and it actually blew them away, I think the only other movie I have seen that has done that was the third Lord of the Rings. I have never been sucked into a movie like this before and never caught myself actually being nervous and on the edge of my seat. The only bad things that I can say about the movie are, #1, that the acting can be a bit amateur, I'm not sure if the actors did that on purpose to make them seem more real, or if they just were like that, but there's a few times, especially early on, that the acting isn't the greatest. However it's NOTHING that can't be overlooked and shouldn't hurt the experience. #2, if you get motion sickness easily, this might not be a good movie for you, I for one had no problems, but my fiancée, whom also loved the movie, had to look away a couple of times. I think the way they filmed it was awesome and added to the realism factor, but be ready to watch an entire movie through a hand-held camera. Other than that I can find no faults, I'm usually pretty picky and hard on movies but this was hands down the most realistic, intense movie I have ever seen. It feels weird describing a movie about a giant monster as realistic, but it is, you really feel like you are right there. There is a part of the movie that you could call gross, anybody who has seen it probably knows what I'm talking about, and when it happened my stomach actually churned. I have seen Hostel, Turistas, and many other movies that push the gross out factor and never even blinked. But I felt so strongly that what I was watching was real and that I was there, that when I saw what happened to this character, I actually felt sick to my stomach, and the craziest part is that technically, you don't actually even see what happens. Also, you DO see the monster, I don't know what people are complaining about, they don't put it in a well lit room and let you walk around it, but you see enough to get an idea of it, any more and I think it would have had less of an impact the times you do get a glimpse of it. In closing, this was one of the most amazing movies I have ever seen, and I have a wide range of movies I think are excellent, from 12 Angry Men, to The Life of David Gale, to The Matrix, I give any movie a chance and this one DID NOT disappoint. I feel bad for the people that don't or didn't enjoy this movie and wanted a typical Hollywood destruction/monster movie, or were not angry that the movie didn't tell them more. This movie is a hands down must see and you have to see it in theaters to fully enjoy it, be ready for a very realistic, very intense, and very vague movie.