A fantastic monster movie!

Rating: 8/10 (18 July 2008)

Let's get this out of the way right now. If you don't like monster movies, you're probably better off not bothering with this.
If you ARE a fan of monster movies, this is probably what you've been waiting for - a genuine attempt to reinvigorate a genre that's considered something of a bad joke (by movie snobs at least). Emmerich tried it with Godzilla a few years back and, while that was a good monster movie, it fell victim to pompous reviewers who clearly didn't have a clue what they were supposed to be enjoying. Similar comments seem to be getting fired at this movie, by people who unfortunately are not prepared to suspend their disbelief for a mere 80 minutes.
Their loss.
Cloverfield tries a different tack than your standard monster movie. With perhaps a nod towards Korean flick 'The Host', the movie focuses on the humans rather than the beast. It's all shot from the point of view of one of a group of (rather tedious) party guests, who tasks himself with capturing events as they occur on a camcorder. What we're witness to is everything that you usually get in a monster flick, but from this unique aspect - the merest glimpses of the creature to start with, followed by mass panic and, eventually, the wholesale destruction of a famous city and its national monuments.
The nature of the film being played back from camcorder footage allows for a couple of neat tricks, and an ending that raises a smile while at the same time being quite poignant.
The film - at a brisk 80 minutes - offers little backstory or exposition, which is something of a relief. While dry explanations and dubious scientific mumbo-jumbo are a monster movie staple, I can live without them, and they had no place in this particular movie. If you need to know more, there are a number of websites you can have fun with, and apparently a manga, that chart the lead up to the attack.
It's a brave movie that destroys New York in such a fashion these days, but I for one heaved a sigh of relief. Filmmakers should never be afraid to trash a national monument or even a whole city for fear of being insensitive, and in this genre it's nothing less than essential. I personally believe the film's choice of location is a bullish 'F you' to the idea of post-attack skittishness affecting media, rather than some kind of tasteless metaphor.
Bottom line, I had a lot of fun with this, and I'll be watching it again real soon.
Keep watching the credits to hear a fantastic, if slightly cheeky, monster movie theme.