Review of Cloverfield (2008) by Adrian Z — 31 Mar 2013
Cloverfield had a fantastic marketing campaign before its release. The online chatter was massive and they created huge amounts of interest through a detailed combination of fake companies and websites and a curious official web page containing random Polaroid's.
It then reached boiling point with a fantastic initial trailer. Cloverfield quickly became a film on everyone's radar. The film revolves around a monster attack on New York and is told from the perspective of a group of people with a hand held camera.
It uses this "real footage" idea to extremely great effect. Most monster movies are CGI laden showcases for the monster itself, but Cloverfield's success lies in the unknown. We are in the same shoes as the small group feeling all the confusion and fear they feel.
Being filmed on a hand held camera there is no soundtrack that only really dawned on me as the credits rolled in silence. The film is extremely well put together and is full of suspense, scares and some great effects.
What was interesting is you never really see the monster in its entirety leaving the audience just putting the pieces together as we see more snippets as the film progresses. My only qualm is one particular scene they do show too much of the monster which took away a bit of the mystery.
Apart from that small issue the film is a found footage triumph.
This review of Cloverfield (2008) was written by Adrian Z on 31 Mar 2013.
Cloverfield has generally received positive reviews.
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