The Cloverfield Experience

Cloverfield begins with a going away party for the lead character, Rob. His best friend, Hud, is charged with "documenting" the whole affair with a video camera. Hud is a big idiot and once given the camera and the commission carries it out with a single minded intensity.

Thus it is that we have a first person account, as it were, of the nameless monster decimating New York City. The use of the handheld camera motif gives this film a documentary feel and adds a sense of immediacy, if not urgency. It was a refreshing change. It succeeds in placing the viewer in the city, watching events unfold as do the characters on screen.

Characters are introduced quickly and efficiently. As Hud learns to operate the camera and gains confidence in "interviewing" people, we learn who's who. Rob is whiny, obsessed silent type. The most intriguing character is Rob's brother; he gets taken out very early on and so we lose the one guy who could have led everybody safely through the terror. That was frustrating. We also meet Lily, the brother's girlfriend. Of course, there's the odd girl that Hud is taken with. Speaking of the cameraman, he's a constantly yapping, irritating moron. In fact, his voice and repetitive questions inject, not humor, but a rapacious desire for him to get eaten - and quickly. Of course, he's the 'documenter' so you know that won't happen.

Also introduced is Beth. Rob's suppressed love for Beth is weaved into the story neatly via snippets of tape that Hud has recorded over. When the camera is dropped or if Hud stops filming to playback a part for somebody these taped over parts appear. It's a quick, fast reminder as to why Rob and his friends are still in the city while an evacuation order is in place. Rob got a distressing cell phone call from Beth. She's hurt somewhere in the city. He's on a quest to save her.

The introductory segment seemed to drag on too long. The same holds true for the rest of the movie, too. It builds up to escape, drags you back to the action, builds up again, drags you back to ground zero and then ends with ... well, a whimpering bang, shall we say? The final few scenes were aggravating. There was no resolution, no conclusion. Some explanatory scenes could have been neatly inserted into the story in the same manner as the love story - quickly, abruptly, just enough to provide a few facts.

Godzilla, the king of monster movies, put a name to our specific fear of nuclear power. The Cloverfield monster is never named, why it attacks is never explained. Perhaps this is a manifestation of the unknown fears we have today regarding the 'nameless' terrorists who attack for, apparently, no reason.

Maybe it's really just a love story. If Rob had proclaimed his love for Beth right off, they might both have been out of the city before the thing showed up, safe and sound somewhere in Japan (how appropriate). But he didn't and the beast made them all pay for it. Yeah, it should have been a Valentine's Day release.

Cloverfield info abounds on the web, so do a search and see what intriguing facts you can find about the monster. As for the movie itself, it's a refreshing new style of filming a monster flick, and it almost lives up to the hype.