Have you ever read a film review where the reviewer at hand calls the movie in question "one wild ride?" Of course you have, because it's the industrialized go-to line in any action flick when a critic is struggling with deadlines and clever musings.
"I don't know what else to say, so I'll just call it a wild ride." That's like calling a young songwriter the next Dylan. Maybe worse.
Well, believe me when I say Cloverfield IS one helluva ride. And it's not a ride the way a Tom Cruise-ified summer blockbuster is. It's a ride the way a roller coaster is. There just isn't any other way to put it. Blair Witch Project with Godzilla and some explosions? Eh, kinda true, but that's like comparing an expensive bottle of merlot to boxed white zinfadel. Corkscrew please?
I ventured to the theatres on Thursday evening with The Mercury's finest selection of entertainment junkies and esteemed colleagues, and I believe I speak for all 6 of us when I say that as soon as we walked out the door of the theatre, we found ourselves urged to dart back to the ticket booth, and get right back on and ride Cloverfield again. It was intense, mystifying and a lovely 90 minutes of sensory overload. We didn't even go back for a refill of popcorn during the screening.
What can you say bad about the movie? Well, you might complain about the shaky camera syndrome it suffers from, but realize that you're complaining about how much of a baby you are, and not the movie at all. The presenation of it is exactly where the magic of this film is. Because seriously, are monster movies believable anymore? Crap no! But when you add the life-likeness of a YouTube video to it, you've just made a monster-movie more than a simple novelty. Maybe that's why the Godzilla and King Kong revamps where, like, way stupid. (I'm sure someone called them action packed thrill-rides too.)
But camera angles aside, it was also impossible to sit through and not sink beneath the film's explosive action sheen and swim around in it's deeper implications, whether they are intentional or not. JJ Abrams has no doubt stirred up peoples emotions and memories of 9/11 in the past with his work on Alias and Lost, but this New York monster movie walks straight into the center of that fire, as opposed to just pointing at it. This baby picks it up and plays with it.
You see burning flames and clouds of dust, major New York City landmarks collapsing to rubble, utter chaos and complete terror. You hear the screaming and crying. It's a nightmare, and absolutely unbelievable, yet in your face and believably happening. Just not really. And that's how we all felt when we saw the news on September 11, 2001.
People would have laughed at the notion of 9-11 before then. Some foreign dudes hijacking planes? And commandeering them straight into the Twin Towers? And collapsing them onto a surprised New York City? Ha! Not in America! We're a bullet proof vest! Well, obviously, the unthinkable became horrific reality.
Now we got a huge and vicious bomb-repelling monster crawling out of the Hudson and snapping Manhattan into pieces of cinderblock and posterboard? Well, this movie makes the absurd seem and feel as real as it could possibly be. You can't watch this movie and not think of September 11, nor can you not think about if JJ Abrams thought about it even more.
Cloverfield is much more than a monster movie, and works on many many levels. While all of you are wondering where the monster came from and moaning about the camera quality, I sat in the theatre wondering if we aren't shown the monster in full exclusive view for a more distinct reason. What does the Cloverfield monster represent in this post 9-11 world? Terrorists? Foreign wars? Underage sex? Cocaine? Pills? The New England Patriots? Hillary Clinton? Carrot Top? Reality TV?
Maybe we aren't shown the monster in full, because Abrams and writer Drew Goddard don't know what the monster represents to them either. Maybe they tried to illustrate to us that the real monster attacking America today is ourselves, in all our confused and cluttered chaos. We're all LOOKING for a monster, labeling everything a monster. Pointing blame, and writing prescriptions for every problem we have in facing society. Everything is wrong with everyone if you talk to enough people today. It's a monster you can't see in full view, but it's bringing down buildings and eating your children and friends and family. Maybe that's why the movie does little to reveal where the monster came from, why it's attacking us, or what it even truly looks like. Because honestly, when you're being attacked by a monster, does any of that matter? Are you going to go to online message boards and wax intellect on it when it's outside on your street?
Which brings me to another point. Maybe the monster was so aggressive and anti-us because, well, we dropped bombs all over his ugly face? Our armed forces went right to war with it. No one said, "yo dude, welcome to America." All these years, and we still discriminate and stereotype. We see a big ugly green thing with rabid lice jumping off its legs and we think "THIS MONSTER IS GOING TO EAT US!" I suppose he started it by decapitating Lady Liberty, but...I think we all know to not kick the school bully in the shins for taking your lunch money. Just sleep with his girlfriend and call it even, but don't draw the battle lines in a battle you know you aren't going to win.
Minutes into the movie, Bill (of Scene & Heard film junkie fame) commented that I was like the lead protaganist, Michael. At first, I was like, riiiight, except the part that I'm not off to Japan, nor am I breaking up with some way-too-gorgeous babe. But as the movie goes on, perhaps I did fit into the character a bit more. Of the whole group, he cares least about the monster. He's more frightened about what the monster's destruction of the city is doing to his friends, his family, and to that special girl he's all tangled up in love with even though she's already found another dude (been there, done that, got the t-shirt). He isn't scared of the monster, nor does he want to fight it. He just wants to find what he loves, embrace it, and get far away from what ever may harm that, no matter the risks involved. I guess that kind of is me. And I guess that makes the monster like regular everyday life in contemporary America. There's always something that might devour us at any moments notice, though not literally.
Let's stop fighting it, and trying to see it in the broad day light. Let's stop complaining about how shaky it is. And let's start high fiving JJ Abrams! Because this movie is the sort of thing I'll be thinking about when I vote next November. It's what I'll be thinking about when I go to the doctor's office. It's what I'll be thinking about at night when I'm listening to records. It's what I'll be thinking about when I meet new people in bars, at parties, and at work. It's one of those rare movies that is about something absurd and unrealistic that makes you weigh in on those things that couldn't be more real in your real life. It's movies like this that make me want to write about things in entertainment, because they take unordinary events and make some of us see how extraordinary real life really, truly is.
Oh, and if you would care to see the monster, here it is. Terrifying.
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Well, the new Star Trek trailer hit the web last week... and while I've never been any kind of Trekkie, this new trailer has me as nerded up for the new movie the way The Dark Knight trailers geeked me out a year ago.
