Cloverfield is an old fashioned monster movie in the best sense of the term. It relies on traditional, tried and tested, behind you, behind you methods that have worked ever since we’ve been telling each other stories but it also achieves something that the best genre movies manage, it captures the mood of the time. In the fifties and sixties, The Threat was the red peril from the red planet, communism, now we have The Osamasaurus, a merciless, indiscriminate, unpredictable menace that strikes, maims, kills yet gives no reason.
The movie ‘forgoes’ modern film technology and instead opts for hand-held, shaky, faux video. We begin the film with a message on screen that this is a video film discovered in an area ‘formerly known as Central Park, then the film ‘runs’ with no explanation, apparently and un-edited account of the events code named Cloverfield. The fake video is a very effective technique which brings immediacy and intimacy in a way that traditional special effects and perfect camera work would not have.
At the beginning, we have an overlong section where Jason, played by Mike Vogel, is handed the video camera and reluctantly shoots the mundane events at a party; beautiful, shiny twenty-somethings discuss relationships and flirt. For a while, to remind us that this is ‘real’, a digital clock runs in real time in bottom left screen. Occasionally, cuts to show the underlying tape which documents a romantic day between two of the main characters which proves to be significant back story. Peace is shattered when the proverbial shit hits the fan. An unexplained earth tremor, or bomb or something and the party spills onto the street. What follows is a desperate and fragmented record of four party goers’ fight for survival.
New York is under threat and in scenes consciously reminiscent of 9/11, crowds run from rolling clouds of dust and shelter in shops. No one mentions the similarity but they don’t need to for it’s part of our collective consciousness. What follows is visceral and truly exciting and more than once I caught myself gazing at the screen open-mouthed. The heroes are pitched into a chaotic battle scene with just themselves, their wits and luck behind them, no weapons, no bags, no coats, utterly naked so to speak.
Director, Mike Reeves, tells what a challenge the camera style was; they had to re-shoot much of footage because it was too perfect and after studying hours of YouTube footage, they get it right. We have people passing between the camera and the subject, shaking, jarring, dropped camera and always just misses the action in the way that you would if something made you jump out of your skin. The cameraman is one of the subjects too. This is his experience and when he gasps and runs we do too. Cloverfield feels very contemporary for this is a society where recording our experiences via blogs and digital images is part of all our lives. When the Statue of Liberty’s head clangs into view, the filmed image courtesy of the screen, naturally includes bystanders holding up their camera phones to preserve this surreal and momentous moment. And in one priceless frame, looters stand in an electrical goods shop, bearing armfuls of cassette players, they too staring open mouthed up at the monitors showing the news and the devastation of their city. The movie manages to keep up the pace, and it’s genuinely thrilling and with consummate skill, holds off from showing the monster providing just occasional glimpses.
There has been some expressions of annoyance among reviewers at how young the five main protagonists are and because they’re ‘annoying kids’ they can’t relate; well, I take issue with that. First of all, they aren’t just monster-fodder like the (on purpose) idiot protagonists in movies such as The Evil Dead; we are invited to care about these people and get to know them, albeit in an overlong section (8 minutes) at the beginning of the movie. Yes, I got a little tired of hearing them talk about their feelings and they wouldn’t be my first choice friends but I also don’t know anyone from Afghanistan and this didn’t stop me relating to the characters in The Kite Runner. Maybe because they’re close in age to my children helped me care but I thought the guy playing Rob, Michael Stahl-David, was particularly good and conveyed emotion subtly and with conviction. I would also never criticise a movie for which I am definitely not the target audience for having youngsters as the protagonists.
The Blair Witch style, viral publicity, has proved very successful but Cloverfield lives up to the hype. It’s the best monster movie I’ve seen since Alien. It teems with moments when you want to bellow at the screen, “Put the light ON!” and “Pick up a weapon, Go’dammit!” Cloverfield is a ride and a half and a tribute to imaginative film making.
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