Cloverfield (2008)

## Cloverfield

Sherryl Clark

Guy Riedel

$170,764,026 (Worldwide)

***Cloverfield*** is a 2008 film produced by J.J. Abrams, directed by Matt Reeves, and written by Drew Goddard. It depicts the attack of a giant monster in New York City, witnessed by a small group of friends. The film is presented as a tape found by the Government after the events of the movie. The filming style is similar to that of *The Blair Witch Project*, given that the film is filmed entirely from the point of a character's video camera. *Cloverfield* is the first in what would become the *Cloverfield Universe*, a film anthology series established following the release of *10 Cloverfield Lane* in March 2016.

## Plot

The movie is presented as digital hand-held camera footage found by the United States Department of Defense. At the start of the film, it is stated the camera was "found in US-447, area formerly known as Central Park". The main record of events is interspersed with footage of two main characters prior to the crisis.

On April 27 at 6:42 am, Rob Hawkins (Michael Stahl-David) awakens after spending the night with longtime platonic friend Beth (Odette Yustman) in her father's Columbus Circle apartment. They plan to visit Coney Island for the day.

On May 22, Rob's brother Jason (Mike Vogel) and his girlfriend, Lily (Jessica Lucas) prepare their apartment for Rob's farewell party, as he has accepted a job as a vice president in his company's office in Japan. Rob's best friend Hudson "Hud" Platt (T.J. Miller) is given a camera by Jason and the responsibility of recording final goodbyes from family and friends at the party, but instead unsuccessfully flirts with his crush, Marlena (Lizzy Caplan). Beth arrives with a date, Travis (Ben Feldman), which upsets Rob. To his dismay, he realizes Hud is taping over footage of him and Beth, including their trip to Coney Island, which shows up intermittently throughout the film. Lily reveals Rob and Beth slept together several weeks previously, which Hud then shares with other people at the party, making the matter worse. Rob provokes Beth and her date into leaving the party.

While Hud and Jason try to talk to Rob, a brief blackout occurs, and the building shakes. When the power returns, everyone turns on the local news, where the anchor explains that there was an earthquake and an oil tanker has capsized in the bay off Lower Manhattan. Curious party goers and apartment dwellers go up to the roof to spot the disaster, where they witness an explosion in Lower Manhattan. As fire and debris begin to rain down, the party goers flee to the street below. The head of the Statue of Liberty, damaged and charred, crashes down into the street beside them. Hud is able to record a glimpse of what seems to be a giant monster moving through the city. The Woolworth Building collapses in its wake, causing Rob, Jason, Hud and Lily to take refuge in a nearby convenience store while the creature passes. After the panic, the streets fall silent, and the group finds Marlena outside, shaken by the events. They decide to use the Brooklyn Bridge to exit Lower Manhattan.

On the bridge, they see the capsized oil tanker and the headless Statue of Liberty. While walking across, Rob gets a cell phone call from a distressed Beth, who tells him that she is stuck in her apartment and unable to move. Hud calls out for Marlena and Lily, but Jason, unable to hear them clearly, does not stop walking. The bridge begins to shake as the monster's tail suddenly appears and crushes the bridge. They are chased by the collapsing bridge, many innocents are killed, including Jason. The bridge collapses finally and Hud films the destruction of the bridge and they retreat.

As Marlena tries to comfort the grieving Lily over the loss of her boyfriend, Hud approaches Rob, who is still stunned at what had just occurred. Suddenly remembering that his phone conversation with Beth had been interrupted, Rob stops at an electronic store that is being looted where he steals a cell phone battery and finishes listening to Beth's message. On the news, Hud sees the Brooklyn Bridge's full collapse as well as the military engaging the monster. The soldiers are attacked by parasitic spider-like creatures that fall off the monster. The four proceed to Manhattan streets to find Beth.

As the group makes their way to Beth's apartment, they are caught in a crossfire between the monster and the military. The friends barely manage to escape into the Spring Street Station. The group decides to walk through the tunnels to reach Beth's apartment. In the tunnels they are attacked by several parasites. One parasite grabs Hud and tries to drag him away, but Marlena fends it off with a pipe, only to be bitten by another parasite.

The group escapes into the abandoned Bloomingdale's department store via the subway station, and are engaged by Pryce and a squad of infantry, who has taken cover inside the department store and set up a field hospital and command center to treat the wounded. Marlena begins to bleed from her eyes and nose, and her right earring falls off as her flesh loses its integrity. When she is revealed to have been bitten, two men in hazmat suits grab Marlena and take her behind a curtain while Lily, Rob and Hud are taken away by soldiers.

Hud films the curtains just in time to see Marlena's stomach expand and explode. Rob and the others have little time to grieve as Sergeant Pryce allows them back up to the streets, but warns them to report to a military evacuation site before 6:00 am, which is when the last helicopter evacuates Manhattan and the military will enact its "Hammerdown" protocol, which will allow for the sacrifice of Manhattan if necessary to kill the monster and the parasites.

The group continues to Beth's apartment, in the Time Warner Center, finding her tower partially collapsed into the adjacent tower. The three climb the standing tower and cross onto the roof of Beth's building and work their way down to her apartment. Beth is found trapped and impaled. After the rescue, they make their way to an aerial evacuation site and encounter the monster once more, while the military continues to attack it.

At the landing zone, Lily is raced into a departing helicopter without her friends. A few moments later, Rob, Beth and Hud are taken away in a second helicopter. In the helicopter, they watch as the monster is bombarded by a B-2 Spirit until it crashes to the ground, seemingly dead.

As Hud prematurely declares the military victorious over the monster, it reaches up and attacks the helicopter, causing it to spin out of control and crash into a clearing in Central Park. The next day, May 23, the three survive the crash and hear a voice on the helicopter's radio warning of the Hammerdown protocol being effected in fifteen minutes, with the pilot telling anyone listening that if they can hear the air raid sirens going off, then they're in the blast zone and have only two minutes to escape.

Hud and Beth pull an injured Rob clear of the wreckage, but Hud returns to recover the camera, and as he does so, the monster appears behind him. It examines Hud for a moment before attacking him. Hud's body is cut in half by the monster's jaws and his upper body is left behind. Rob and Beth grab the still filming camera and take shelter under a bridge in Central Park as air raid sirens begin to blare in the distance, indicating that the Hammerdown Protocol is about to commence. Rob and Beth take turns leaving their last testimonies on camera, just as numerous explosions occur outside and the monster can be heard screaming. The bridge collapses and, as debris covers the camera, Rob and Beth can be heard professing their love to one another before another explosion occurs.

## Staff

Staff role on the left, staff member's name on the right.

* Directed by   Matt Reeves
* Written by   Drew Goddard
* Produced by   J.J. Abrams, Bryan Burk
* Executive producing by   Sherryl Clark, Guy Riedel
* Music by   Michael Giacchino (end credits)
* Cinematography by   Michael Bonvillain
* Edited by   Kevin Stitt
* Production design by   Martin Whist
* Assistant directing by   Rip Murray, Katie Carroll
* Special effects by   Kevin Blank (visual effects supervisor)

## Cast

Actor's name on the left, character played on the right.

* Lizzy Caplan   as   Marlena Diamond
* Jessica Lucas   as   Lily Ford
* T.J. Miller   as   Hudson "Hud" Platt
* Michael Stahl-David   as   Robert Hawkins
* Mike Vogel   as   Jason Hawkins
* Odette Yustman   as   Beth McIntyre
* Margot Farley   as   Jenn
* Theo Rossi   as   Antonio
* Brian Klugman   as   Charlie
* Kelvin Yu   as   Clark
* Liza Lapira   as   Heather
* Lili Mirojnick   as   Lei
* Ben Feldman   as   Travis Marello
* Elena Caruso, Vakisha Coleman, Will Greenberg, Rob Kerkovich, Ryan Key, Hooman Khalili, Rasika Mathur, Baron Vaughn, Charlyne Yi   as   Party Goers
* Roma Torre   as   Herself
* Rick Overton   as   Frantic Man
* Martin Cohen   as   Burly Guy
* Jason Cerbone   as   Police Officer
* Pavel Lychnikoff   as   Russian Man on Street
* Billy Brown   as   Staff Sgt. Pryce
* Scott Lawrence   as   Lead Soldier
* Jeff DeSerrano   as   Soldier
* Tim Griffin   as   Command Center Officer
* Chris Mulkey   as   Lt. Col. Graff
* Susse Budde   as   Medic
* Jason Lombard   as   Second Medic
* Jamie Martz   as   Helicopter Pilot

The film cuts to Rob and Beth's Coney Island date, during which a satellite can be faintly and briefly seen falling from the sky into the ocean.

After the credits roll, a static video message is heard saying "Help us!", but when played in reverse it says "It's still alive!" suggesting that the creature lives.

## Appearances

* Clover
* Human Scale Parasites
* King Kong (stock footage; still frame)
* Rhedosaurus (stock footage; still frame)
* Giant ants (stock footage; still frame

## Box office

*Cloverfield* opened in 3,411 theaters and grossed $16,930,000 on its opening day in the United States and Canada. It made $40.1 million on its opening weekend, which at the time was a record for January domestic releases. Worldwide, the film finished with $170,602,318.

## Sequels

Following *Cloverfield*'s release, director Matt Reeves was asked about the possibility of a sequel, and stated that he was open to producing one. In subsequent interviews, Reeves and J.J. Abrams both entertained the idea of a sequel to *Cloverfield*, stating that they had set up an entire backstory for the film that they would like to explore in a sequel. Despite their enthusiasm, no concrete information surfaced about a *Cloverfield* sequel for several years.

On January 15, 2016, a surprise trailer for a film entitled *10 Cloverfield Lane* played before screenings of *13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi*, also produced by Paramount Pictures and Bad Robot. Directed by Dan Trachtenberg and starring John Goodman, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and John Gallagher Jr., it had been filmed in late 2014 under the name *Valencia*. The film was released theatrically on March 11, 2016. Though not a direct sequel to *Cloverfield*, *10 Cloverfield Lane* is described as a "spiritual successor" to the film and serves as the second entry in an anthology begun with *Cloverfield*. The third entry in the franchise, *The Cloverfield Paradox*, was released directly to Netflix in 2018, and connects to the first film's events, with Clover or another member of its species making an appearance onscreen. Abrams announced a fourth film at CinemaCon on April 25, 2018, describing it as "a true, dedicated *Cloverfield* sequel." On January 29, 2021, *The Hollywood Reporter* revealed that Joe Barton would be writing the script.

## Alternate titles

* ***1-18-08*** (USA; Promotional Title)
* ***Untitled J.J. Abrams Project*** (USA; Working Title)
* ***Cheese*** (USA; Working Title)
* ***Clover*** (USA; Working Title)
* ***Monstrous*** (USA; Working Title)
* ***Slusho*** (USA; Working Title)
* ***Cloverfield - Monster*** (*Cloverfield - Monstruo*; Argentina)
* ***Cloverfield: Monster*** (*Cloverfield: Monstro*; Brazil; *Cloverfield: Monstruo*; Mexico)
* ***Monster*** (*Чудовищнo*; Bulgaria)
	+ ***Monster*** (*Monstrum*; Czech Republic)
* ***Monsters*** (*Монстро*; Russia and Ukraine)
* ***Monstrous*** (*Monstruoso*; Spain)
* ***Monstrously*** (*Pošastno*; Slovenia)
* ***06-02-08*** (France; Promotional Title)
* ***04-05*** (Japan; Promotional Title)
* ***Cloverfield/HAKAISHA*** (クローバーフィールド／ＨＡＫＡＩＳＨＡ; Japan)
* ***MONSTRAS Project*** (*Projektas MONSTRAS*; Lithuania)
* ***Project: Monster*** (*Projekt: Monster*; Poland)
* ***Code Name: Cloverfield*** (*Nome de Código: Cloverfield*; Portugal)
* ***Beast*** (*Canavar*; Turkey)

## Trivia

* Frames from three classic monster movies (*King Kong* [1933], *The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms*, and *Them!*) appear throughout *Cloverfield*. Each functions as a form of subtle foreshadowing.
	+ A giant ant from *Them!* at 24:08 foreshadows the revelation that Clover is the host of hordes of six-legged parasites.
	+ The Rhedosaurus from *The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms* at 45:29, whose blood contains a deadly disease, foreshadows the sudden and fatal effects of a parasite bite.
	+ King Kong at 1:06:55 foreshadows Clover's attack on Hud, the only time the film shows the monster taking interest in a specific human.
* The Asylum, an American studio specializing in knock-offs of blockbuster films, produced *Monster* to capitalize on *Cloverfield*. They released it to DVD on January 15, 2008, three days before *Cloverfield* was released in American theaters.
* A fragment of the Japanese satellite ChimpanzIII mentioned in the film's alternate-reality game can be seen splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean in the film's final scene.