Cloverfield and its Sorta Kinda Not Really Sequel

Following the release of The Blair Witch Product, there was a brief lifespan where found footage films were new and hip. This technique takes the perspective of a character of the film deciding to film everything going on, and it’s through this lens that the audience sees. This is the style of Cloverfield—it’s horror like the low-budget witch hunt film above, but this is all about normal young adults living in New York that get caught up in an attack from a giant monster thing.

            If you’re sitting there thinking that a blend of found footage and giant monster flick sounds like something that belongs on the SyFy channel, don’t discredit it immediately. Using both the strength of a strong marketing campaign before the release of the film and the fact that J. J. Abrams was a producer, this movie gained traction.

            Besides being found footage, the film is known for one other interesting aspect. The plot revolves around an attack from a giant monster, and you get glimpses throughout the film, but you don’t get a good look at it. And this is by design to keep the audience grounded in the characters’ perspectives. Basically, a lot of the film rides on it being found footage. So does it work? Well, I will say that there’s a bunch of running around that causes shaky camerawork to a nauseating effect. And I’m sure just with that witch in the forest film, the handheld cam is supposed to entice more suspense and horror from the film. There’s a couple moments from the film where I thought to myself “Huh, that’s pretty cool.”… But that’s it. There’s a scene in a subway tunnel obviously meant to be scary, but I really don’t think the movie was scary.

            Ultimately, it’s a monster flick with boring characters trying to upgrade itself with a fad. I guess I enjoyed watching the movie, but it held no impact on me otherwise. Well, that’s not totally true because the ending is the most preventable ending I have ever seen. You know what’s going to happen a minute (this is actually a long time when you know what I'm talking about) before it actually happens, and it makes you realize how dumb either the characters were or the screenwriters were because they needed more tension at the end. It’s stupid and dumb and I don’t like it.

            In the words of J. J. Abrams, let’ move on to the blood relative movie! Let’s move on to the movie that wasn’t even written in the same universe until Abrams’ production company bought it and reworked like probably a page worth of material to make it tie in to Cloverfield! That’s right. I’m talking about 10 Cloverfield Lane. After a car accident near Lake Charles I think, Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is “rescued” by Howard (John Goodman) and taken to his bunker next to his farmhouse where she also meets Emmett (John Gallagher, Jr.) who had a track scholarship to Louisiana Tech but decided not to go because he thought he was too dumb. Which he really probably is. The bunker they’re in is fully equipped and prepared for an apocalyptic situation that Michelle is skeptical about but Howard is adamant towards; it’s a good thing it’s well equipped, too, because we spend the majority of this film in this bunker listening to Howard’s eclectic taste in music and watching fictional films like Cannibal Airlines.

            Just to be clear, this film doesn’t use the found footage format. And that’s a good thing for this film. But the camerawork is not what I’m concerned with here. I always talk about story and characters, but this film has a unique situation on how these 2 critical elements are intertwined with each other and the success and failure of each.

            I wouldn’t say the characters are boring like they are from the previous film. You get your surface characters and they each tell stories designed to make you care about them more later in the film and whatnot. They aren’t poorly written, but I didn’t fall in love with anyone—but character arcs are so critical in a confined movie like this with 3 principal characters. Never really cared about Michelle—I always found her rash and quick to jump to conclusions. Emmett tries to bring humor, and I laughed on occasion, but he is a bit more of a filler character. The interesting one is Howard. John Goodman is downright incredible. He’s supposed to be a character that wavers between moral father figure and possible pervert kidnapper. And I’ll explain some of the problems with this from the story perspective in just a bit, but the characterization itself by Goodman is scene-stealing.

            I have multiple problems with the story, so let’s see how much I can get out. This movie doesn’t know what it wants to be. It hints at a drama focused on the characters, but then it’s like the movie thinks to itself, “Wait a minute, I’m supposed to be a horror film!” and then makes characters think or act irrationally. Like when we first meet Howard, he is this mysterious character that doesn’t explain anything and only leaves a plate of food while Michelle is tied up to her mattress, so this makes her jump to the conclusion that he kidnapped her. I swear in the first 20 minutes Michelle stabs Howard and hits him over the head with a bottle; the very following scenes to both of these incidents is Howard explaining his backstory which provides rationale as to the way he acted. It’s plot convenience for the sake of unnecessary tension, and I will have none of it!

            But the plot convenience is not the biggest insult this movie makes. That would be relating itself to Cloverfield. So much of this move depends on Michelle believing that the air outside will kill her just because Howard said so. That’s an interesting idea that could make any plot reveal interesting if it weren’t for the fact that anyone who knows anything about the previous film will know exactly what the situation is exactly like. This also means that we know the inevitable. What I mean by this—and if you consider this a spoiler, then you don’t watch movies enough and probably won’t ever see this film anyways—is that we’re going to see the outside at some point and there’s going to be monsters. That only leaves the question throughout the film of how we end up outside. And that’s a much less interesting question when the best character is the sort of antagonist.

            Probably the biggest similarity between these 2 films is the fact that I didn’t like the endings. You can give me somewhat valid reasons for the monsters in 10 Cloverfield Lane, but I still see a huge disconnect between those things and the giant creature from the first film. And I just think the ending is stupid. If you want me to give a spoiler reason why, feel free to ask me about it. Because it’s also stupid and dumb. Not as atrocious as the garbage ending from the first film, but still pretty offensive.

The story creates innate flaws within Goodman’s character, but he is talented enough to overcome these to give a still excellent performance. Oh, and this is the first film directed by Dan Trachtenberg. For a first outing, I’d say he gives pretty strong directing, and that’s no small feat with a film like this. If you’re still curious about these 2 films, I have 2 recommendations. If you’re bored one night, at the very least you can call these films somewhat enjoyable. Or if you are simply curious at the outcome of both films, look up a quick summary. That might bring as much joy as actually watching the films.