Cloverfield Is The Best Monster Movie In Decades

Cloverfield is J.J. Abrams bastard child of Godzilla and The Blair Witch Project, but you already knew that. I know Godzilla was not very well accepted and is generally regarded as a terrible movie (which it is), yet I can’t help but retain some prepubescent attachment to the movie. When I first saw the movie I couldn’t help but like it. It had a sweet big dinosaur-esque monster owning up on some big buildings, and at the time my sense of smell wasn’t developed enough to pick out the scent of shit. Either way I liked the movie. I still feel some kind of appreciation for it, even if I have to ignore that smell of poo that I can now pick up rather easily. Anyways this movie is much like Godzilla in the way that it’s a huge monster going around the Big Apple toppling over buildings left and right, but one way that Cloverfield differs from Godzilla is that it does not wreak of feces.

This movie is not bad by any means. J.J. Abrams has crafted a beautiful cinematic experience and I believe it’s safe to say that he has also created one of, if not the best, monster movies ever made. Now with that out of the way I’m also going to say that this movie is not perfect. I had some issues with it. One thing that I noticed is that many times the video resolution switched throughout the movie. The movie opens and continues throughout being recorded by your standard single grand high-def camcorder. You can tell that the resolution is not nearly as high as your standard high budget blockbuster movie. This of course has an exception because for some reason they decided to use a higher resolution during intense scenes of action, explosions, and monster goodness. I don’t understand why they couldn’t just record with the same camera model the entire movie. I think the resolution changes brought me out of the experience, and every time it happened I ended up chuckling myself by the cheesy little effects they would pull as it transitioned between the different video qualities. Another thing that I found that brought me out of the experience was the constant little nonsensical cuts that happened. I doubt that a person recording a documentary of a giant monster attacking New York City would have the time or desire to flip the Rec switch on his video camera off and on in a repetitious fashion.

I said earlier that Cloverfield is the bastard child of Godzilla AND The Blair Witch Project. Where the Blair Witch Project influences come into play are through the camera and storytelling. The entire movie is shot like a bad YouTube documentary and it uses this as a constant reminder of the connected world we’re living in today. This may be an issue with people who are prone to motion sickness, but to be 100% honest anyone who has ever been stuck watching a boring recording of a family vacation should be able to sit this one through. The similarities between Cloverfield and Blair Witch also extend into the plot progression of the movie. The movie plays out more like your average horror flick than a monster movie. Equally unimportant characters are all introduced lined up and then picked off one by one by one. The characters are not by any means very deep, they don’t offer an insight into our own humanity, and you don’t really care if they all die horrible deaths. What you do care about in this movie is the world these characters are living in. You want to see them victorious in their personal struggles just so you catch an extra glimpse of what is going on in the rest of the city. You want to see the monster, you want to see the crowds of people running from and reacting to the monster, you want to see the monster duking it out with the military, you want to see the monster taken down and out. All of these things that the movie makes you want to see is what makes it so intense and fascinating.

It is obvious that in making Cloverfield J.J. Abrams was not afraid to throw in a little bit of reality to make an impossible situation all the more fearful. Many people have attacked Abrams for throwing in certain scenes that will bring you back to 9/11 Deja Vu for being tacky and cheap. Many others have also stated that they believe he has tried to make a message movie but its lack of message leaves it just a dumb action movie cashing in on post 9/11 fear. In his defense I don’t believe Abrams ever tried to make Cloverfield anymore than an innocent non-incentive popcorn flick and his use of the post 9/11 terrorist themes are just the movies catalyst. They are there not to prove a point, offend, or remind. They are there to make the unbelievable seem just a little more believable, to bring a little bit more reality to the unreal, and help set an even darker tone for the movie.

The last few months I’ve been following J.J. Abrams attempt to keep his new blockbuster monster movie’s secrets concealed. If you’ve ever seen any episodes of Lost I’m sure you’re familiar with Abrams passion for secrets and twists. After staying in touch with Hollywood buzz and knowing for the most part the basic plot outlines of most movies going to the box office, I was excited for a movie that was entirely curtained from the Internet, ready to have its secrets revealed on opening night. Well I went in, came out, and the most surprising thing that occurred to me when the flick was over was, “there wasn’t any plot spoilers to protect, or be revealed.” This wasn’t necessarily a disappointment to me because it was entirely unexpected, and I was entirely fooled by Abrams and his marketing division. It’s not usually a good feeling to be completely tricked, but somehow I felt that any other way probably would have been a letdown. The movie itself has a plot but it’s not where the creature comes from, what it is, or what it’s purpose for attacking Manhattan is. It’s also not really about the characters or their mission. I found that the movie’s best and most gripping plot were the people’s reaction to the creature and its effects on the city.

Cloverfield is a good, intense, and emotionally unsettling movie. J.J. Abrams has done a masterful work both stylistically and cinematically to bring an engrossing monster of an epic to the big screen. Between the explosions, blood splattering, and shaky amateur camera movements I think it’s apparent that Cloverfield is quite the gem.