Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

Updates:

Cloverfield (2008)

Director: Matt Reeves

Time Out rating

Average user rating

109 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

Six years after 9/11, the spectacular destruction of Manhattan is once again the premise of a Hollywood fantasy, though ‘Cloverfield’ is not your father’s disaster movie. Unaccountable trauma takes the place of scientific rationalisation; partial experience replaces the view from the war room; and the signifiers of the World Trade Center – fireballs, collapsing towers, dust clouds and drifting paper – are everywhere. Whether you find it all cathartic or exploitative is probably a matter of taste.

Following Steven Spielberg’s ‘War of the Worlds’ in presenting an ignorant, panicked, individuated response to armageddon, ‘Cloverfield’ takes that film’s single shot of fantastic carnage captured on a home video camera as its whole aesthetic.

The film is an ersatz relic à la ‘Blair Witch’, the purported contents of a camcorder discovered in the aftermath of a mysterious behemoth’s catastrophic rampage through New York. The camera belongs to Rob (Michael Stahl-David), a twentysomething about to move to Japan; his leaving party takes place on the night of the attack, and we follow his and a few friends’ experiences from dusk to dawn. Footage of an earlier, happier day out punctuatesthe main action.

The film is produced by JJ Abrams and, like ‘Lost’, it leaves the big picture vague while furnishing enough local information to keep the ride compelling. Though not without humour – our cameraman Hud (TJ Miller) provides goofy comic relief – this is at the gruelling end of the disaster movie spectrum, unabashedly mining its 9/11 resonances and neo-vérité grammar to considerable effect. The humans are ultimately pretty disposable, but the monster and the camera are worth attention.

Author: Ben Walters 2008-01-29 17:38:03

Time Out London Issue 1954: Jan 30 to Feb 5

Bookmark

User reviews of this film

babess said...

Posted on Feb 17 2008 17:17 wht is the age for this film
??? =]

Report as inappropriate
nicola said...

Posted on Feb 16 2008 18:17 how can ne1 call this a gd film? its the worrst film i hav eva watched they could at least hav had proper cameras so we cud actually c wat was goin on i was very dissapointed

Report as inappropriate
scottyp said...

Posted on Feb 16 2008 17:11 ok. if you like alternative, different movies then read on. if you like poor remakes and teen angst style films then you may as well go and rent out the back catalogue of dawsons creek.boring. jj abrams has delivered a masterpiece. ok it aint gonna win oscars but your jaw will drop. it has to be seen to be believed. it has suspense love action and humour all in a handy little cam. ppl liken it to blair witch. definitely not. this is sooooo much better. i can see a spin off..namely godzilla. watch this space!

Report as inappropriate
fgfgfgfgfgfgfgf said...

Posted on Feb 16 2008 13:29 brilliant

Report as inappropriate
rogerrabbit said...

Posted on Feb 16 2008 11:12 I have to laugh ...but 10 mins before this movie started a trailer was played to put the public off from buying copy dvds with **it picture quality & sound on them,& to say the only place to see a movie with great picture &sound is at the cinema!!!!!This movie cloverfield is nothing short of a **it copy you would get at a local market . There was a Q forming to get out of this ...ive seen better copies in local pub !

Report as inappropriate
beth said...

Posted on Feb 15 2008 21:18 I thought this film was alrite although i didn't get bits at some point. the point of the film is to have a all over the place camera, so basiclly if you don't like the blair witch project because of the camera dont see this! simple as.

Report as inappropriate
Dominico said...

Posted on Feb 15 2008 12:07 I Loved this film. The choice of handycam view makes it feel so real for a monster movie. The best way to describe it i would say is a rollercoaster ride, it even makes you sick at some points (i had to look away when they are running etc)
You often feel like you are there and the special effects for the city scape are very well done, giving a "city under siege" feeling. Yes the monster is crazy looking but its an alien or deep sea monster... its impossible to make something like this believable!!
For a fun action movie, amazing! If you want deep characters and emotional scripting then wrong film. Go get some popcorn kick back and enjoy one of the freshest films in a long time.

Report as inappropriate
mel said...

Posted on Feb 14 2008 22:13 this film is one of the worst ive seen its ok but the camra was everywer so you couldnt see what was goin on it gave me head ake!! i woudnt recomend it!

Report as inappropriate
wayne elliott said...

Posted on Feb 14 2008 15:41 Thought the film was fantastic. Very well done to the director for this original movie. I was on the edge of my seat from the party onwards. I and all my friends loved it. Cheers J.J Abrams

Report as inappropriate
MellowYellow said...

Posted on Feb 14 2008 12:22 having read about this movie and the use of 9/11 image referencing, I was sceptical of the claim simply because poor old NYC has been attacked so many times by monsters and invading aliens in the celluloid past. However, having now seen the movie, the claims are beyond doubt, and blatantly so. The collapsing skyscraper shot and the following massive dust cloud racing up the street is an almost perfect copy of the 9/11 footage. Having said that, the concept of a 'real' participant in the disaster capturing all on a hand held (definitely on Duracells) camera is a reasonable attempt at something different (notwithstanding Blair Witch). It works really well at first especially at the initial monster attack. The novelty begins to wear off though, and the sea-sickness inducing camera shaking tires you out and for me became a bit tedious. The much vaunted tunnel scene was a let down and frankly I've seen similar things on Dr Who. The idea of just catching glimpses of the monster works well, and when we get to see a bit more it's not a bad design, although touches of 'giant frog thingy'. This creature gets my award for the toughest critter ever to set foot on 5th Avenue, and while it's on a city sightseeing tour, takes enough hot lead from the US military to wipe out a small continent - this is one tough beasty. I won't spoil it for those who haven't seen but must mention one scene where 'beasty boy' takes a full load from a stealth bomber and merely gets bachache - respest!! Not a classic but worth a look if you like spewing your hot dog over your lap with motion sickness. M.Y.

Report as inappropriate
xemilyx said...

Posted on Feb 14 2008 11:01 me n ma bf fort da film was shit i nearly fel asleep in was onli 60mins lng i wudnt recommend it 2 any1 xxxxx

Report as inappropriate
Ronnie said...

Posted on Feb 14 2008 00:48 From the trailer I expected some kind of sci-fi main blockbuster. When the camcorder-shot started at the party I still had hope this would be the chosen art-form for the party only because it was tiring for my eyes and it made me really sleepy, especially as it was all pretty boring. Then I sort of woke up by the first big bang from outside that scenery ... and I soon had to learn that the whole movie was probably shot in amateur-camera-style. So I though: well if they had decided to shoot it like Tom Cruises "War of the Worlds" audiences might have said: So what, we've seen it all. So to judge it in this aspect the best you might say it's shown in real-life-style like the worst amateur camcorder-owner would have done it. On the other hand, who knows how you would operate a camcorder under these extreme situations. So even though the whole cam-short-art is very tiring it has got something that you might call authenticity. Apart from several unrealistic moments, that have been mentioned in this forum before, the film has no plot ... on the other hand THAT even might be the plot. There is no explanation where the monsters where coming from and there is no end to it. The only hint we get is the statement of one of the soldiers ("Whatever we are dealing with is winning") and the one of the rockets the army was shooting in the park at the end of the movie was probably also killing the last survivors of the helicopter crash ... well, that is at least what I first thought of when the credits were running after the credits started running. So the plot might be called: The only remains/video-diary of the last hours in the lives of twens on Manhattan. Certainly has strong reminiscences to the disaster-images form 9/11. And since that trauma has not come to an end yet (worldwide) the open end in the movie might pay tribute to that political fact as well. But giving the film all those thoughts the authors might just laugh about it and say: thanks for making far more out of the film than we had intended.

Report as inappropriate
Zac Chandler said...

Posted on Feb 13 2008 00:09 It's like Blair Witch on a citywide scale with scary monsters, guns, a helicopter crash and exploding people.
What's not to love?

Report as inappropriate
leesh said...

Posted on Feb 12 2008 22:01 a stupid film that is pretty pointless, the ending is crap. basically if you want to watch a film that watches people run around screaming because of some monster, the all dying then go & waste your money watchinf this pile of unworthy star ratings but ive give it one just for the fun of it

Report as inappropriate
critique said...

Posted on Feb 12 2008 16:50 Nice idea, technically accomplished but requiring a major suspension of disbelief. Biggest fault for me was, in spite of a laboured character-introducing party scene, the protagonists were disappointingly two-dimensional so the viewer couldn`t care less whether they live or die.

Report as inappropriate