Cloverfield
Jan. 27th, 2008 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nancylebovI'd call it a little better than fair-to-middling with some good unusual features. I'm sure you should see it if you want to see the complete range of horror movies, but otherwise, you'd better really like Lovecraftian-looking monsters. No hint of Lovecraftian cosmology, but I'm not sure that can be done in a movie.
Let's see how much I can say without having spoilers. I'll put any spoilers in my first comment.
The best thing about the movie was the monsters. The worst thing was that the people weren't very interesting.
The big monsters were exceedingly fine--scary, alien, and very smooth CGI. The close view of a monster's face changing near the end of the movie had me thinking that I don't want to see that in my dreams, and I think that's the first time I've had that reaction to a movie. Their noises were also satisfactorily scary.
The little crab/spider/scorpion things were good, but not extraordinary.
The main character was an unusual choice -- he's got much more courage than most, but he isn't an athlete, and certainly not a CGI superhero. If only he could act better.
The failures of realism I noticed were that apparently New York has no children or old people, and no handguns. That last would have been useless against the bad monsters, but the little (maybe a yard across) crab/spider/scorpions would have had a much rougher time of it.
As you may have heard, the movie is mostly (entirely?) shown as hand-held camera video. I handled the unstable point of view well enough while I was watching the movie, but felt a little queasy afterwards. I'd say that anyone who was ok with Waking Life should be able to manage the camera work easily.
Emotionally, I feel as though it's about bewildering, frightening time right after 9/11.
Let's see how much I can say without having spoilers. I'll put any spoilers in my first comment.
The best thing about the movie was the monsters. The worst thing was that the people weren't very interesting.
The big monsters were exceedingly fine--scary, alien, and very smooth CGI. The close view of a monster's face changing near the end of the movie had me thinking that I don't want to see that in my dreams, and I think that's the first time I've had that reaction to a movie. Their noises were also satisfactorily scary.
The little crab/spider/scorpion things were good, but not extraordinary.
The main character was an unusual choice -- he's got much more courage than most, but he isn't an athlete, and certainly not a CGI superhero. If only he could act better.
The failures of realism I noticed were that apparently New York has no children or old people, and no handguns. That last would have been useless against the bad monsters, but the little (maybe a yard across) crab/spider/scorpions would have had a much rougher time of it.
As you may have heard, the movie is mostly (entirely?) shown as hand-held camera video. I handled the unstable point of view well enough while I was watching the movie, but felt a little queasy afterwards. I'd say that anyone who was ok with Waking Life should be able to manage the camera work easily.
Emotionally, I feel as though it's about bewildering, frightening time right after 9/11.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-28 03:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-28 07:33 pm (UTC)Plural? I thought there was just one?
The main character was an unusual choice -- he's got much more courage than most, but he isn't an athlete,
And yet, he (and his friends) travel halfway across Manhattan on foot, then (after a night with no sleep), traverse at least 70 flights of stairs *twice*. And on the return trip, they're traveling with a heinously wounded person, who also seems to have no trouble making that trip. That's where I lost my willing suspecsion of disbelief.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-29 01:02 am (UTC)As for suspension on disbelief, if a hideously wounded person can make the trip, then maybe it wasn't all that hard, at least in that universe.
Manhattan is very narrow. I'm not sure where they started, but it seems unlikely that they walked more than 5 miles. The flights of stairs and lack of sleep are more relevent.