Cloverfield review by Casey C. Corpier

[BIGFANBOY]

Cloverfield
review by Casey C. Corpier

Does anyone out there remember 10 years ago when the American version of Godzilla came out? Mostly I remember the ad campaign. The First thing that I saw was a New Year ad with a giant tail destroying the ball at Times Square on New Years Eve and that was followed my a few other teasers over the next few months. Now the most that you saw was a tail here, and a foot there. I know that we all remember the add with the Taco Bell chihuahua riding the monster’s tail. Nothing really giving away what the monster looked like. However by the time that the film premiered on Memorial Day of that year the fleeting glimpse approach had given away to marketing and movie tie ins. There were already drink cups at Taco Bell with Zilla on the cup and a contest that if you spelled Godzilla you won the grand prize. I also remember the Zilla cup holders for the car that was designed to look like the monster so that you can fit a 32oz drink into the holder. As well as other advertisements that are showing the Monster in all his glory. In the end, however, Godzilla is best remembered for it’s over marketing than the American debut of one of the most famous monsters of Filmland. One year later we saw a different marketing Campaign for a new type of film - The Blair Witch Project. What we had here was a very modest budget on the film itself, but a million dollar marketing campaign telling us about the story of 3 student filmmakers that disappeared while filming a documentary about a local myth. What the viewer was shown was that the filmmakers had recovered footage detailing what happened to them in the woods. The way the film was marketed was with more trailers and TV spots that made you the viewer believe that this was all genuine, and the biggest help was using the internet which was at that time rarely used for marketing a film in the way that it is used now. The film went on to break box office records and end Halloween’s 20 year run as the most profitable independent film ever made. That was all fine and dandy until the “missing filmmakers” were seen in other movies as well as making appearances on the Tonight Show and on MTV promoting the movie and other publicity stunts. That was a fact that eventually angered main stream audiences for feeling that they were fooled. The biggest eventual complaint was the hand held shaky cam effect that many complained that made them nauseous in the theater. Now being that I am a professional cameraman, I’m honestly used to that feeling because it is how I live my life through the lens of my camera, however I have come to understand that some people do get really nauseous with that effect.

The point that I am trying to make by this brief Cinema History lesson is that this past week I was invited to a advance screening of Cloverfield. What we have here is the story of an assault by a giant malevolent creature that wants to attack and destroy the island of Manhattan, as told through a camera that we are told in the beginning of the story from is found video footage that was recovered at a site that was formally known as Central Park. First off I want to talk about the marketing campaign of this film. Paramount went to great lengths to keep the monster a secret. When they had marketing materials for the film from trailers to TV spots, the monster was never shown just people reacting, not even a roar was heard. The print material like the poster only showed shots of the beheaded Statue of Liberty, leaving us with a strong desire to see the film just to see the creature. Believe me Paramount even went so far as to inform us that they had 6 security guards inside the theater with night vision goggles watching us to make sure that no one was using their camera phones. Text messaging wasn’t even allowed in the theater. I’m surprised that we weren’t wanded with metal detectors like we were at the screening of Superbad. I do have to give credit to them in that regard. Cloverfield like The Blair Witch Project also relied on the internet to do most of it’s marketing with MySpace pages and websites, and even going as far to throw “Rob” a party in New York City on the date of the opening for winners of the online contest.

Anyway enough of that lets talk about the movie. Basically we are introduced to everyone attending Rob’s surprise party to celebrate his move to Japan. We find out that Rob has an unrequited love in the form of Beth, who he has an upsetting argument with forcing her to leave the party after mean words are exchanged. At this point all hell breaks loose when a giant monster attacks the city and everyone panics, and we are shown the chaos that ensues from looting to injured people to police and military intervention. At the next point Rob gets a call from Beth begging for help that she is trapped inside of her apartment and the monster is in her area. Needless to say Rob is determined to get to her and that is all that I am going to give away about the plot.

One thing that I will give credit to is the fact that in all other movies like this the star of the film is always the monster. He has all the hype, all the scenes, and all the action. In this film however the star is clearly the characters in it that are just trying to survive. I also liked the fact that the entire movie is told by their point of view, and what they know is all that we know about their situation and what they are up against. The characters I felt were also genuine and likable, and you felt that you were out there with them and wanted them to survive... and get to safety... and stay as far as they can from that insidious creature.

Now as far as the creature goes the only thing that I am going to say is that I saw the entire movie and I'm still trying to figure out just what in the heck that thing was. It was something that I have never seen before and I have to give them points for originality. Now as for the drawbacks that I earlier mentioned with The Blair Witch Project with the gratuitous shaky cam effect - I was watching the movie with a friend, and she didn’t last 5 minutes before she had to leave the theater and later told me that she had a monster headache from the film as did I after the film was over, and was dizzy from the action and camera motions. For that reason I have to say that despite the fact that Cloverfield was a good movie, I have to recommend waiting for DVD on this one. I’m sure that with the special features that it will have it will be worth the wait.

Hundreds of Dead Bodies
0 Breasts
1 Giant Beast
A lot of explosions

That is all I want to give away for right now so that I don’t hurt the Movie for anyone. That and I promised that I’ll keep it a secret... at least until opening day, then I can do what ever the hell I want.

2 ½ Stars for Theater
3 Stars for the DVD
Check it out on DVD

[od0_ital]

Sorry, I stopped readin' the review when ya said Halloween was the most successful independent film before the release of The Blair Witch Project. Figured that sort of title would be applied to something from the Star Wars franchise, considerin' George Lucas is the most successful independent filmmakers pretty much ever.