Shake, shake, shake (shake your movie, shake your movie)...

Rating: 8/10 (17 January 2008)

Despite the fact that so much mystery surrounded Cloverfield prior to its release, anyone who's seen the trailers should at least have *some* idea of what this movie's about. I think it's pretty clear from the trailers that there's a monster attacking NY, that everything's shot on hand-held camera, and there's a lot of running, screaming and explosions involved. If you're expecting something else, then you'll surely be disappointed. If you're not used to watching shaky documentary-style movies, then Cloverfield possibly isn't for you. I'm sure it'll give some people motion sickness (there'll be vomiting in the aisles or whatever) but thankfully, I didn't actually feel queasy when watching this.
I appreciate what this movie was trying to achieve (ie. making something as unbelievable as monsters running loose around New York into something tangible and real). It was pretty much what I was expecting: a monster movie done as if it were reality. I think the trailer did a good job of setting the mood and gave you this feeling of eeriness, because you knew nothing about what was attacking the city. I also think that what kind of hurt the movie was the fact that it gave away what the thing looked like fairly early on. I'm sure all those who were worried that we'd be robbed of getting a good, long look at the monster will be satisfied with the closeup of it towards the end. I myself could have done without so many shots of the beast. No matter how good the CGI, we were never going to be fully convinced by this thing. Although the animators do an admirable job, the first time you partially get to see it, it just takes you out of the realm of believability (that so much time was devoted to setting up at the start). I think that getting the occasional glimpse of the thing's tail or claws would have been sufficient enough until the end reveal. However, most would probably disagree with me there.
The element to the movie which many would perceive to be the weakest (the humans) was what I personally thought held the film together. Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, Michael Stahl-David, Odette Yustman and T.J. Miller play Marlena, Lily, Rob, Beth and Hud. These are the people we follow throughout, and if they weren't at all engaging or were absolutely detestable, following them on their fight to stay alive would have been a painful experience to endure. Luckily, they all come off as realistic, very human and, admittedly, not without some flaws. Yes, they make some questionable decisions occasionally, but given the nature of what's going on around them, you can understand how some lapses in judgement might occur. Thank goodness for the reluctant cameraman, Hud. His comments, whilst perhaps a little ill-timed at certain points, kept me amused. I think the subject of flaming hobos will be brought up quite a bit in future discussions thanks to this movie.
Rob, I guess, would be the most likely candidate to be labeled the "hero" of the film. But not in that real annoying sort of way. He, as well as the others, do pretty much what anyone might do in such a situation. While the beginning of the movie - which set up the relationships of the characters - might have been deemed a bit "slow" by some people, you can see why there was time devoted to helping us understand how each person related to one another. Rob and Beth's relationship is of particular importance (given how it plays into the last half of the movie). I'm unsure as to how much of the dialogue was improvised, but considering how natural it sounded and what things were said, it does seem likely that a lot of it may not have been written into the script. I guess the only thing that might have made it seem a bit more realistic would've been some harsher cursing than what we heard.
For anyone who is expecting answers to all their questions....just....don't, okay? There aren't really any. The monster's origins are speculated upon by Hud, but pretty much everything is left unexplained (such as "Why would anyone in their right mind be worried about filming something with a video camera instead of running for their life?", "What made that girl explode?", "Does the video camera have an everlasting battery?", "How does somebody manage to run around, seemingly fine, after having a re-bar through their torso?", "Why did Rob go running back towards where the monster was to save Beth?" - actually, that last question I can answer. I mean, have you *seen* Odette Yustman? Pretty worth it, in my opinion). Despite all this, so long as you don't need everything spelled out for you and you actually enjoy having some things left to debate/your own interpretation, then you should be content.
We are informed right from the start that the video was retrieved from a site "formely known as Central Park" (which suggests that Central Park no longer exists). Taking this into consideration, the ending shouldn't come as any real surprise. What's more surprising is the fact that some people actually found the ending surprising and felt massively let down by it. Honestly, how did you think it would end? Given what we were told at the beginning, it should have come as no surprise that there'd be zero survivors (but even that is left up for debate). I'm of two minds as to what my overall feeling about this movie is. On the one hand, it certainly provided some frights, some excites and some uh...delights? But on the other, you're just left with a sense of..."Hmm." once the end credits start appearing. I don't know what you're expected to take away from this movie, but I thought it mostly succeeded in what it set out to do: give you a scare or few for your buck.