Scared sick

A nasty beast kicks the shit out of Manhattan in Cloverfield, an exciting take on the tired monster movie genre. After many months of pre-release hype and viral marketing, what arrives is worth all the commotion: a scary, very shaky (physically, not technically) somewhat emetic disaster movie whose effect is often distressingly real, so real that some folks I saw it with seemed ready to puke.

The premise is that a tape has been found in Central Park after an unexplained disaster, and our task is to sit back and watch it. It begins with playful couple Rob and Lily (Michael Stahl-David and Jessica Lucas) as they speak to one another after a night of apparent unabashed sexuality.

The video spends a little more time with them, but then we skip ahead to Rob’s going- away party—he’s leaving for Japan—with he and Lily no longer together. After a few minutes of character development, there’s a big tremor, then another, then a nasty roar, and then explosions and beheaded national monuments. The film never lets up from here and possesses a high freak-out factor. Whatever it is attacking the city, we only see it in brief, partial glimpses.

Cloverfield is a shaky, shaky movie. It’s filmed with a handheld camera, and seen mostly through the perspective of Hud (T.J. Miller) somebody who is not used to a video camera. Hud doesn’t always hold the camera to his head; sometimes it is at his side as he runs like hell to safety or is dropped on the ground when he’s knocked off his feet. Simply put, the effect can be disorienting to the audience.

I saw many people get up and leave during Cloverfield. Every 30 seconds or so, somebody would woozily walk down the steps toward the entrance. Sometimes they came back, and sometimes they were never seen again.

It’s hard to say that the movie will give you motion sickness if you are prone to that sort of thing. I get sick on Disneyland’s tea cup ride, but the movie didn’t make me dizzy. Still, I’ve heard more reports of people ready to puke from this movie than I did for Woody Allen’s handheld opus, Husbands and Wives. My advice is to give yourself some distance from the screen.

Director Matt Reeves and producer J.J. Abrams (the man responsible for Lost and all of its mystery and self-contained mythology) reveal nothing obvious about the monster’s origins. This makes perfect sense because the group the viewer is running with knows nothing other than that something big is making mayhem. It’s reptilian in nature, and it sheds spider-like parasites that do very horrible things to members of the cast. With only brief glimpses at television sets and quick chats with military men, the group remains uninformed as to what is attacking them, as do we.

Give the cast of relative unknowns credit for acting as if they aren’t acting, and doing it well. Their dialogue and reactions seem very spontaneous, and nobody behaves as if they are “faking” a reality scenario with scripted lines (something that marred Brian De Palma’s lame Iraq War drama, Redacted). The special effects, including the destruction of the Brooklyn Bridge, seamlessly blend into the video format. The monster’s swishing tale and clawed feet look very real.

As for the monster, the audience does eventually get a long glimpse of it at a story juncture I will not reveal so as not to spoil any of the plot. I’ll just say that it’s an ugly bastard, and I wouldn’t want it in my city.

I had a great time at this one. You’ll hear some folks liken it to a scary amusement park ride, and I belong in that party. You’ll also hear some folks claim the jittery film made them ill, so proceed with caution if “shaky cam” has given you headaches in the past.