sit very very far away from the screen, and don't expect too intellectual content

Rating: 4/10 (16 January 2008)

This short feature has more viral hype than a bad film looking for box office figures through marketing, but it ain't in the same category. The idea of capturing the terrifying 7 hours supposedly on a video camera is not completely new in cinema, and here it works, though don't sit too close to the front you'll be as nauseas as a channel ferry on a rough day.
I do like the way the story is fairly contained to the characters, I'm still wondering what a Cloverfield actually is, and following the four to five characters running around the city keeps you busy, so at first you don't notice the large plot holes. But there comes a point where you giggle to yourself at how preposterous some of scenes are, and this makes the film feel like an expensive film school project. Those old fashioned idea's like character development, plots, and a sturdy tripod have been thrown out in this film as it tries to be the new cool kid of monster movies.
I'm quite undecided how I feel about this film, apart from the motion sickness of a complete feature being shot as hand-held, the fact that the characters survive the un-survivable, that we never really get to know any of the characters, except for Rob, and it seems America is still working through that event of seven years ago in New York, but it does leave a mark on you as you walk out of the cinema and expect half the world to be destroyed, I almost feel disappointed it is not.