CLOVERFIELD

Paramount Pictures
Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey Karten
Grade: C-
Directed by: Matt Reeves
Written By: Drew Goddard
Cast: Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, T.J. Miller, Michael Stahl-David, Mike Vogel, Odette Ystman
Screened at: AMC 34th St., NYC, 1/18/08
Opens: January 18, 2008

It’s about time somebody struck terror into the hearts of the yuppies, the 20-something people of little substance who party all weekend, who do no real work other than shuffle papers and crunch numbers. In “Cloverfield,” director Matt Reeves brings Drew Goddard’s script to life by forcing these denizens of Lower Manhattan at one point to leave their privileged island condos and cross the bridge into (gasp) Brooklyn. The horror! The horror! As one guy says to his woman friend, “Have you ever been to Coney Island?” (Hint: Coney Island is in Brooklyn.) Can you guess her response?

Director Matt Reeves's experience has been mostly for TV episodes but is known by movie buffs for his 1996 movie “The Pallbearer” (a young man's life is thrown into a loop when he is asked to be a pallbearer for the funeral of a classmate he doesn't remember, and his old high school crush temporarily returns to town.) He takes conceptual advantage of the remarkably unpredictable success of Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez’s 1999 film “The Blair Witch Project,” coupling that minimalist, rural tale with the classic of Japanese horror, “Godzilla,” last seen in Roland Emmerich’s 1998 pic starring Matthew Broderick. He makes several mistakes, however, One is that he should never have shown the monster. This gives the audience the impression that the beast could presumably be killed by the U.S. Marines, later if not sooner, by bombs, missiles, bullets and the like. Another is that his characters, most of whom must be living in the high-expense Soho district of Manhattan through parental finances—are insipid and interchangeable. A third is allowing Drew Goddard to write dialog even dumber than what you’ll find in Andy Tennant’s movie “Fool’s Gold.” Man, that’s dumb.

About this last point. The yups aim for the Guinness Book for the movie that violates the Third Commandment more than any other in history. Examples:
“Omigod.”
“Omigod!”
“Omigod?”
“Omigod.”
“Omigod(?)”
(about 50 times)

On a less Divine level, there’s the Shakespearean in the group who, upon the approach of the monster, says:

“Let’s get the hell outta here!”

Then there’s of course that obligatory expression found in 83% of ALL movies:

“Are you all right?”
“Are you OK?”
(Did you ever hear anyone ask this of someone who IS OK? Like, ever?)

There’s no external indication why the monster picked Soho to stomp around and set loose some giant arachnids, but we in the audience are intelligent enough to know: It’s the yuppies, stupid!

You see yuppie Rob (Michael Stahl-David) has been made vice president (presumably because he’s an expert at vice, like with a woman named Beth) and is given a surprise party before he is to go to Japan (ironically getting a chance to escape Godzilla!). The party and everything else is being vid-taped by Hud (T.J. Miller), a mayven at giving the movie audience vertigo—leading leftists in the audience to wonder whether part of the 25 mil was financed by the Dramamine folks. There’s something about hanky-panky between him and Beth (Odette Ystman), though Beth probably won’t come back for more after her face gets scratched by Rob’s fashionable 3-day beard. Then explosions! Noises! Great balls of fire! Blackout! Green lenses on the videocamera!

Actually Hud is not holding the camera. That credit goes to cinematographer Michael Bonvillain who is probably in his twenties, thus able to keep up with Rob and company as he tracks their furious run away from the monster. Rob, however, heroically holds back to save a friend stuck in a high rise that thinks it’s the Leaning Tower of Pisa, traveling on foot through the Lincoln Tunnel where the rats are leaving the city—though wise enough to be heading north and not to Brooklyn.

“I don’t know what to say!” shouts one of the young women. Neither does scripter Drew Goddard. The monster, noting the corruption of the language of Milton and Shakespeare, discreetly keeps his (her) mouth shut. At least she (he) is nice enough not to embarrass them with his (her) comparative eloquence before having his (her) way.

Rated PG-13. 84 minutes. © 2008 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online