Operation Enduring Love

Rating: 5/10 (5 December 2008)

A lot of things get smashed, destroyed, and brokenheck, most of Manhattan, for that matterin "Cloverfield," but the film never really breaks through the surface of getting us to care much about it. The most high-profile film of 2008's "found footage" fad is rife with spectacle in its attempt to postmodernize the drive-in flicks of the 1950s, where some Inexplicable Thing (irradiated bugs, hostile aliens, or plain'ol monsters) bears down on our resourcefulbut all too humanprotagonists. Yet "Cloverfield" falls shortthe ultimate result has scattered moments of palpable fear, but never really finds a suitable emotional pitch until it's almost over, and by then the plot machinations render any real sympathy a moot point. The film is problematically populated by narcissistic young-professional types residing in NYC, who are at Ground Zero the night some Inexplicable Thing attacks Manhattan; instead of fleeing, our young heroes instead set out to find the girlfriend of the main protagonist, trapped in her apartment complex. "Cloverfield" takes elements from "Godzilla" films, Gap ads (the no-name cast is certainly model-caliber, if nothing else), and even "Shaun of the Dead" (down-and-out guy trying to win his girl back in the midst of extenuating circumstances), filtering the unraveling spectacle through a first-person perspective; this gimmick, surprisingly, doesn't work as well here as it did in "Diary of the Dead" and "Quarantine"instead of heightening visceral experience, it paradoxically draws too much attention to itself ( having the camera guy constantly mentioning his need to "document" everything doesn't help matters), while at times wanting to draw attention away from a lot of obvious CGI. And it's hard to be pulled into a survival situation when even the extras look like they've been done up by professional make-up artists. The blatant references to 9/11 don't resonate on a level any deeper than their blaring-neon obviousness, and come across as simplistic attempts to lend the film a social significance it doesn't deserve; and the glossy slickness of the film's look overall actively works against its chances of delivering a terrifying, in-the-moment experience. As with most experiments, "Cloverfield" is conceptually impressive, but a maddening disappointment overall.