Cloverfield

Cloverfield (Rated PG-13)

Running time: 1 hr 25 mins

Cast:

Michael Stahl-David
Lizzy Caplan
Jessica Lucas
T.J. Miller

Critical consensus (www.rottentomatoes.com):

***1/2 out of *****

My consensus:

****1/2 out of *****

The premise: Revolves around a monster attack in New York as told from the point of view of a small group of people.

My review: Cloverfield is by no means a perfect film, but it is a damn good one. There isn't much to it. There is virtually no compelling storyline, no stand out performances, nothing that warrants this film an Oscar nomination at year's end. However, it will easily be one of the most entertaining and original action films of 2008. From a filmaking perspective, the movie is brave. The entire thing is hand held camera, which apparently made audiences queasy...whatever, those people are stupid. I believe the camera work defined this movie. If it was a standard film camera, with a standard known cast, the movie probably would have bombed. Let's face it, Cloverfield is a basic monster movie, that we've seen millions of times over the years. But J.J. Abrams was bold in his creation of the movie, and how he decided to show it to us as audiences. Speaking of the monster: yeah, theres no explanation whatsoever of why it's suddenly attacking New York. There is NO closure at the end of this movie. When it ends, it ends. As far as we know, the monster is still roaming when the camera stops rolling. But that's the beauty of the originality of the film. The film is taking place before the characters eyes, therefore, we are experiencing the events as they are! We don't need explanation. If we were there, we wouldn't care, we would just be running for our lives! So with that, Cloverfield is a top notch action movie, because it's daring and original in its format. It has re-defined the monster movie genre.

My advice: See it!

*This movie is now on DVD.