I have unabashadly been looking forward to Cloverfield since I first saw the teaser at an advance screening of Transformers last summer. Granted, very few hype films live up to their hype, and very few gimmick films work as well in practice as they do in theory. Cloverfield, I am giddily pleased to announce, is an exception. The film lives up to its hype and delivers on its premise; it is tense, emotionaly gripping, and mercifully free of the extraneous explanation of events that so frequently deflates movies of this sort. In short? It could be the perfect monster movie.
The film is presented as a piece of declassified evidence from the files for "Cloverfield," the code name for the recent devastating attacks on Manhattan by a creature of unknown origin. This piece of evidence is, more specifically, the contents of a camcorder's SD card recovered from the "former site of Central Park." To the filmmakers' immense credit, there is no frame story. There are no flashbacks or flashforwards (save for some cleverly executed and judiciously sprinkled bits of what the attacks were recorded over). There is no explanation of where the monster came from, how far it got, or the specifics of how it was stopped. Ignore everyone who criticizes this supposed "lack of resolution"; this is a monster movie wherein the monster is secondary. Cloverfield is a film about people trying to survive a catastrophic event. That event could be an earthquake, a flood, a terrorist attack -- it just so happens it's a monster.
Also to the credit of producer J. J. Abrams, director Matt Reeves, and screenwriter Drew Goddard, there is humor in the film. Not action movie one-liners or Corman-esque goofiness, but rather humor that stems from the characters and is entirely appropriate for the circumstances of the film. (Most of which comes from primary cameraman Hud (T. J. Miller), who proves a most enjoyable guide through a series of increasingly unsettling events.) Were this levity not present to occasionally difuse the tension of the film, audiences would be laughing inappropriately. But Cloverfield rarely loses its audience, and only strains credulity during the few money shots of the monster, mainly due to the inherent unbelievability of CGI.
Ultimately, it is only the lazy, reductive, simple-minded moviegoer who will watch Cloverfield and miss the craft with which it is constructed. These are the viewers who watch movies based on James Patterson novels and pride themselves on being able to guess the "twist" in a movie before it happens, but well after it has been thoroughly telegraphed through a series of red herrings and vapid, expository dialogue. Cloverfield is a visceral, thrilling film which takes a surprising number of risks in its execution, subverting the puerile and obtuse expectations of the genre which have become trite and cliche. Say what you will about J. J. Abrams and his proclivity for hype and gimmickry, at least he trusts and respects his audience to appreciate something outisde and above the norm.