Wiggly Socks Movie Reviews

By Linda Winsh- Bolard


This thriller reminds us that producers love cheapies that bring in money. In this case, the Blair Witch Project. I am sorry that the producers, and the director, never got over the shock of active balance that Blair Witch produced for the distributor, because had they been able to think independently, they might have made more interesting film.

The gimmick in Cloverfield tis just the same: the entire attack and destruction of New York, actually just the parts that are so well known it would play well, so Manhattan and its bridges, is seen through the viewfinder of a camera of an accidental cameraman recruited originally to tape a party.

An inexperienced cameraman with no visual talent, the longest lasting tape and battery the world had ever seen (over 7 hours) and under attack by a stomping-slithering 90-foot tadpole who is dropping off spider like men eating tadpoles as it goes about its business.

Hud (T.J. Miller) was given the camera at the go away- to Japan- party for Rob (Michael Stahl-David), and he never lets go, not even in pitch dark tunnels of New York subway, not when attacked by one of the dropped tadpoles, not climbing up or down. I guess he is glued to that camera because any other person would have tossed it right at the beginning of the trouble and run for life, in this case literarily.

Rob is leaving behind his girlfriend Beth (Odette Yustman) even though she just this smashing girl. But once the trouble starts, he is hell bend on saving her from her toppling down 39 stories high apartment building in danger to be bombed. Even more surprising is that his friends and brother Jason (Mike Vogel), Jason's girlfriend Lily (Jessica Lucas), Marlena (Lizzy Caplan) also risk their lives on the journey to hell rather than getting out fast.

The party is in some West End apartment and takes up the first twenty minutes of the film with nothing much to say. As the earthquake like tremor hits the apartment Hud runs out to film. The partygoers go first on the roof to have a lookie, then down into the streets. They travel though lower parts of Manhattan, Spring street station and its tunnels to about Central Park. They willingly leave a first aid station. Rob calls his Mom to tell her he is all right. And of course, they keep dying.

The monster makes his/her existence felt rather than shown for most of the film. Bits and pieces are seen but the whole thing is kept in the dark. Unfortunately, that is not new. The shaking destruction, exodus, falling bridge and helpless armed forces are tired. As the friends are told that Manhattan might be destroyed on government orders, I nearly yelled: Have you never heard of AMR (it goes, very precisely, on distances longer than a mile, though concrete, metal, or anything else combined and pulverizes whatever it hits. If Tadzilla were too armored to be killed by it, its weight would prevent it from walking the surface of Manhattan)? And an infectious disease on top? Again?
If it is about fear and being helpless, as the genre demands, that it misses the changes we all went through since at least 9/11. But perhaps it is not, perhaps Ty Burr of boston.com gave the best evaluation: Because it's not really happening unless it's on videotape - any kid will tell you that. "Cloverfield" captures the chronic self-absorption of the Facebook generation with breathless, cleverly recycled media savvy, and then it stomps that self-absorption to death. These days, that's entertainment

For me the marriage of the Blair Witch Project and Godzilla gimmicks had little new to show, it has nice special effects destroying things that get destroyed every few years (in films), such as the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn bridge, panicking people running and getting killed. Whether post 9/11 crowds would still linger around after dust clouds and noise appear I have no idea.

The shaky, distorted, badly framed picture gets annoying with time. It is often an effective tool, but it needs to be use wisely, believably and with some understanding that a movie is to be seen. Even some 80 minutes of this makes you remember that any idiot tends to held a camera steadier that the paid for cameraman of this film.

The marketing was visceral, ever present and suggestive. Internet buzzed with expectation. Nobody was really talking, just teasing. It built up momentum. That is always dangerous because the audience will expect so much that it is likely to feel disappointed. In this event it was crushed under the mundane not under the Tadzilla.

At the screening I attended the critics guffawed and finally laughed at the absurdity of it all. Still, I have to point out to John Anderson (Washington Post) that it is not true that the dialog consists mostly of OH my God!!! I am certain that there is equal amount of We’ve got to get out of here!!!

Truer words were not spoken through the entire film.

Script Drew Goddard, directed by Matt Reeves, produced by J.J. ("Lost") Abram,director of photography, Michael Bonvillain; edited by Kevin Stitt; production designer, Martin Whist; visual effects by Double Negative and Tippett Studio.
Cast:Lizzy Caplan (Marlena), Jessica Lucas (Lily), T. J. Miller (Hud), Michael Stahl-David (Rob), Mike Vogel (Jason) and Odette Yustman (Beth).