(subtitled: another review)
For once I saw a movie in the last six months that honestly was as good as I pumped it up in my head and yes, that was Cloverfield, which I was written about probably more than I'd live to admit. Politics? Eh. Giant monster movie? Yes!
I read or heard a review that mentioned what they loved about it that the audience is never explained what is exactly happening. There is never a person/scientist who sits the main characters down and says, yes, this is what's happening and this is what it is and this is how it became that way and this is how we are going to kill it. You never know. What is it? We never know, we are left guessing and panicking just as everyone else is. But if you've followed the websites and theorist sites (just as complex and deep as JJ Abrams's Lost sites), you get the impression this is a very deep sea creature that has been living under our waters and has been mutated by the people in Japan who make the Slusho drink and use a secret deep sea ingredient. Why doesn't it attack Tokyo? Who knows; Godzilla destroyed most of it? All you know its virtually indestructible and isn't stopping.
As in the now mocked Blair Witch Project (and come on, lets be honest, that scared you when you saw it and you never saw anything like it before, don't pretend that isn't true) the entire film is shown via a hand held camera. You are told the story of a small group of people and them trying to escape. But alas, it is never that easy. They live in downtown Manhattan. The scariest part is that you realize just what Manhattan is. It is a small island. The only ways in are by tunnels or bridges. And if you think the bridges survived the attack, no, they did not and in an amazing sequence the Brooklyn Bridge is destroyed (as it, the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty are always the first to be destroyed - see any destruction film, especially Independence Day). Of course, all these "sequences" are scattered (much like this review). The person holding the camera, the amazingly lovable Hud (while walking down the subway tunnel he has a fear he describes that I can't put here only to make you want to go see the movie - it might be the funniest line I've ever heard in a movie), is running away from it most of the time and usually has to pull himself together to show/look at the monster (and eventually monsters - yeah, it spawns) attacking him and his friends.
What I thought was really amazing was how it felt exactly how I think it would be like in if this very implausible situation were ever to arise. At first people are screaming that its another terrorist attack. Then what the media reports isn't correct and not even close. When the amazing shot of the Statue of Liberty's head comes rolling down the street, yes people scream and panic but afterwards they whip out their camera phones and immediately start snapping pictures. What else would you expect? There is looting and panic and people running, not knowing where to go. People are shuffled around by the military only to be thwarted by the monster and shuffled somewhere else. Department stores are turned into military stations and yet it seems to take forever for the government to taken any real measures. One of the eeriest parts for me is a general tells this group that at 6am, the military is essentially going to abandon Manhattan, leaving everything behind, it is a lost cause. This gave me chills - I can't exactly explain why. I live on this island and there are 1.5 million people who permanently live here and to think that with tunnels and bridges cut off that it would be abandoned and taken as a lost cause scares me.
The end, for me is utterly heartbreaking. I can't stop thinking about it. It replays in my head over and over again and I thought it turned the whole monster, blockbuster, city destroying genre on its head. The hammered in the point that the story is being told by real people with real lives who are scared out of their minds. They have lost hope and seen death. No, its not some Oscar worthy emotional powerhouse, but it makes it the ever more real.
The person I saw it with thought it was unbearably implausible but I found the horror so real even though the creature was very unreal (you know you see it and you still don't know what it is) and that what the characters did wouldn't be what she would do. But thought it was and if they did what they were really suppose to do then there wouldn't be much of a movie would there. If Seth Rogen had put on the condom like he should have, there wouldn't have been Knocked Up, or would have been extremely unfunny and illtitled.
The biggest peeve that I head from people was that a) god, why do we have to watch a movie about rich 26 year old yuppie types. I guess they wanted Brooklynites (hey, there was extreme yuppie types in Brooklyn) who were poor and lived in boring apartments. Whatever. There was b) how in God's name did they walk from Spring Street to Columbus Circle (about 4 miles) in a descent amount of time and although walking through subway stations, not ever realize they were close? Um, yeah, I have to agree with that. That would honestly take over 2 hours and if you were injured you would be in so much pain that it would probably take you much longer. And then there was c) "God why did they all have to be like young attractive people?" I don't know what movies you've been going to for, oh the last 100 years, but movies usually feature very attractive people. Sometimes they are called movie stars and get their photo taken a lot and get paid a lot of money to be....attractive. Barbers in London don't look like Johnny Deep, killers don't look like Javier Bardem or Viggo Mortesen and the people who buy Real Girls do not look like Ryan Gosling.
So just relax. It's only a movie. The Brooklyn Bridge will not be taken down by a large tentacle, people in most of lower Manhattan will always be rich and Slusho will always be made out of a delicious mystery substance.
)
