Fun

Rating: 8/10 (1 May 2008)

I liked this! Cloverfield is basically Godzilla for the 21st century. There is no plot except for: Alien monster destroys New York and people freak out.
The movie lives of the way it's shot. The hand-held camera IS the movie. We've seen the carnage before, the monsters, the battles, the turmoil ... just never from this perspective. It works great! (Although it's not the reinvention of the wheel that J.J.Abrams wants us to believe - Blair Witch Project ... hello?) There is nothing much to judge "objectively". The camera-work inherently belittles any acting performance, since there's rarely a steady shot of any actor. The same goes for the special effects or the directing of crowd sequences, etc. But at the end of it all, experienced through the shaky first person perspective, the movie feels sufficiently realistic.
The only thing that I didn't like was the voice of the camera man Hud. He annoyed me. His comments were off and people mostly ignored him (rightfully so).
I'm giving it 8/10.