An unbalanced mix of Scary/Silly & Deep/Shallow

Rating: 5/10 (12 June 2011)

There are some great moments near the beginning of this dense script where you feel that Spielberg Magic. Like Drew Barrymore in "E.T.", Elle Fanning stands out as a young talent. When there is subtly in the storytelling of the coming-of-age dimension of this film, you feel grounded in a solid drama. Natural based humour around goofy teenagers works to start with. But then a way too convoluted conspiracy develops with no chance of making sense. Here is where the large wish list of ideas that Spielberg and Abrams dreamed up begin to dismantle the momentum that we the audience had invested in for the first 45 minutes or so. Gone now is the magic as a poorly written B-movie monster horror flick invades the town.
"Strange" things begin to happen all over town with such over-the-top silliness and randomness that the storytellers make their fatal flaw. You throw so many "mysterious" incidents at the audience with such succession that we no longer can keep track of what the clues are supposed to mean and begin to no longer care. Thankfully the mostly solid acting is able to drag you through the nonsensical military invasion going on in the town. We have the troubled father of Fanning's character Alice. At one point he has a deep emotional impact upon the backstory, but then is clumsily written into being involved with defeating the bad guys.
There is a Jekyll/Hyde dichotomy to this movie. At one point you feel it could be a better take on an M. Night Shyamalan film take can convincingly bring terror into the domestic environment (like "Sixth Sense"). Other times, it feels like a too silly to be taken seriously "Goonies" type of adventure. Which brings us to the monster that is supposed to be the big scary killer lurking behind the scenes. (Not a spoiler here) It turns out the monster is too fake to be believable. There is "Jurassic Park" inspired monster attack that makes up the final act that just does not have the same impact. Abrams' "Cloverfield" was much better at creating a chilling dark creature that could make you jump. In that film there is a smaller insect-like alien that lurks in a subway that is genuinely terrifying. Nothing in "Super 8" comes close to that level of chills. Which leaves only the thrills, and the train wreck that is a centerpiece of the film does a good job of it. The extended train disaster launches large train cars into the air at frightening speeds with monster sound effects as they crash and explode with summer popcorn movie splendor (especially in Imax).
This movie gets a mild thumbs up for all the positive intentions of Abrams' script. He is a disciple of Spielberg, and it is good to see that other filmmakers can recreate the old school magic, as he does here literally by creating 1970's homages to Spielberg movies. This includes overlapping dialogue of hyper teenagers, sweeping crane shots of bicycles through middle class neighbourhoods, a John Williams style score, Vilmos Zsigmond style lensing, and attention to little details in the kids environment. All of this works well, and I applaud Abrams for displaying his knowledge of the Spielbergisms. Unfortunately that also includes the gimmicks that Spielberg adores so much. In the third act, all the characters become chess pieces as they race around to witness and discover some very implausible stuff that helps reveal the big conspiracy. By then however, there are large military trucks taking over the town, and eventually the lamest looking battle scenes that all but remove any subtlety that began so quietly at the beginning. Despite this, we are hauled through a great deal of relationship melodrama that feels like remnants of one of Abrams TV dramas. The second act gets especially bogged down in emotional situations that at that point do little but destroy the momentum of the impending danger of the sometimes forgotten monster on the loose.
I give it a slightly favourable 6 out of 10 since there was nothing bad enough in the clunky storytelling that turned it into a Tony Scott-like embarrassment.