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Cloverfield

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Cloverfield
American theatrical poster
Directed byMatt Reeves
Written byDrew Goddard
Produced byJ. J. Abrams
Bryan Burk
StarringMichael Stahl-David
Mike Vogel
Odette Yustman
Lizzy Caplan
Jessica Lucas
T. J. Miller
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release dates
January 17 2008 (NZ[1] and AU)[2]
January 18 2008 (US)
February 1 2008 (UK)[3]
Running time
90 min.
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$25 million[4]

Cloverfield is a 2008 American monster movie produced by J. J. Abrams, directed by Matt Reeves, and written by Drew Goddard. First publicized in advance screenings of Transformers, the project was released on January 17 in New Zealand and Australia, and is scheduled for a January 18 release in the United States, and a February 1 release in the United Kingdom. Paramount Pictures is carrying out a viral marketing campaign to promote the film.

Plot summary

The film begins with a message from the U.S. Government, saying that the following footage was recovered from the site formerly known as Central Park. The rest of the film is shown through handheld video footage, with an occasional flashback to Rob and Beth filming themselves on April 27th.

On May 22, Jason Hawkins (Mike Vogel) and his girlfriend, Lily (Jessica Lucas), plan a surprise going away party for Jason's brother, Rob (Michael Stahl-David), who has accepted a business position in Japan. Jason entrusts Rob’s best friend, Hud (T.J. Miller), with the video camera, so he can tape the party and document Rob’s last night in America. The party at Rob’s Manhattan apartment begins and all is well, though Hud has no luck flirting with his crush, Marlena (Lizzy Caplan), from behind the camera.

Rob arrives and is happy to see all his friends. Things get complicated quickly, though, as it’s revealed that Rob recently slept with Beth (Odette Yustman), making their longtime friendship more complicated just before he leaves the country. Beth arrives at the party - but with a date. When Rob confronts her about the date, she claims they haven’t spoken in weeks (presumably since right around their sexual encounter). Beth leaves with her date, and Rob hints to his brother that he cares for Beth, although he never told her this.

The building’s power temporarily fails, and partygoers watch a news report saying that an oil tanker near the Statue of Liberty has capsized. Dozens of people head to the roof to get a look, only to witness a huge explosion in the distance. Down on the street, the Statue of Liberty's head crashes down onto the roads, and everyone witnesses more explosions and a gigantic moving form in the distance. Rob, Jason, Lily, Marlena and Hud all head for the Brooklyn Bridge. While on the bridge, Rob gets a call from Beth, who is now injured and trapped in her Midtown apartment after an explosion. Just then, a giant tail comes out of the water and destroys the bridge, killing Jason among many others. Rob and his friends head back to Manhattan.

Rob says that he is heading to Midtown to save Beth. After unsuccessfully pleading with him not to do so, his friends follow. Meanwhile, everyone starts to learn more about what exactly is attacking the city. Marlena says that she saw something huge “eating people” while a TV newscast shows the giant moving creature dropping large spider-like parasites onto the ground, which immediately attack nearby humans. The foursome’s journey into Midtown brings them to a battle between the monster and military forces. Rob and his friends descend into the subway for safety and decide to walk the tracks to Beth’s building. In the darkened tunnel, they are ambushed by several spider creatures and Marlena is bitten badly. They escape and, fortunately, rendezvous with military officers. One officer informs them of an evacuation helicopter site, and reveals that the situation in the city is so out of control that it won’t be long before the government authorizes a plan to destroy all of Manhattan in an attempt to kill the creature. Marlena dies gruesomely from her spider bite (she seems to become inflated and then explode) — something that deeply affects Hud.

The remaining three arrive at Beth’s partially toppled building, but must access it through another building and dangerously cross damaged rooftops high above Manhattan. They discover Beth, who has fallen and impaled her shoulder. After freeing her and fending off another parasite, they escape the buildings and board evacuation helicopters just as the giant creature attacks nearby. Lily is separated during the evacuation, with her escaping in a different helicopter. Flying above Manhattan as day breaks, Rob, Beth and Hud witness military planes attacking, and seemingly killing, the giant creature. However, the creature leaps out of the smoke plumes and swipes at the helicopter, causing it to crash in Central Park. Hud, Rob and Beth survive the crash, only to look up and see the creature towering over them. After the creature kills Hud, Rob grabs Beth and the camera and hides underneath a bridge. He gives a final testimonial to the camera and tells Beth that he loves her. An explosion rocks all of Manhattan and kills them both, and the camera is covered in rubble.

At the end of the credits, a small sound clip is played. Filled with static, 'Help us' can be heard faintly.

Cast

To prevent the leaking of plot information, instead of auditioning the actors with scenes from the film, scripts from Abrams's previous productions were used, such as television series Alias. Some scenes were also written specifically for the audition process, not intended for use in the film. Despite not being told the premise of the film, Lizzy Caplan stated that she accepted a role in Cloverfield solely because she was a fan of the Abrams-produced television series Lost, and her experience of discovering its true nature initially caused her to state that she would not sign on for a film in the future "without knowing full well what it is." She indicated that her character was a sarcastic outsider, and that her role was "physically demanding."[8]

Production

J. J. Abrams conceived of a new monster after he and his son visited a toy store in Japan. He explained, "We saw all these Godzilla toys, and I thought, we need our own [American] monster, and not King Kong, King Kong's adorable. I wanted something that was just insane and intense."[9] In February 2007, Paramount Pictures secretly greenlit Cloverfield, to be produced by Abrams, directed by Matt Reeves, and written by Drew Goddard. The project was produced by Abrams' company, Bad Robot Productions.[10]

The poster for Escape from New York (1981) inspired the scene of the decapitated head of the Statue of Liberty in Cloverfield

The casting process was carried out in secret, with no script being sent out to candidates. With production estimated to have a budget of $30 million, filming began in mid-June in New York.[10] One cast member indicated that the film would look like it cost $150 million, despite producers not casting recognizable and expensive actors.[8] Location filming, shot in digital video using hand-held video cameras,[11] took place on Coney Island, with scenes being shot at Deno's Wonder Wheel Amusement Park and the B&B Carousel.[7] Some interior shots were filmed on a soundstage at Downey, California.[12] The film was edited to look like it was filmed with one hand-held camera, including jump cuts similar to ones found in home movies. Director Matt Reeves described the presentation, "We wanted this to be as if someone found a Handicam, took out the tape and put it in the player to watch it. What you're watching is a home movie that then turns into something else." Reeves explained that the pedestrians documenting the severed head of the Statue of Liberty with the camera phones was reflective of the contemporary period. "Cloverfield very much speaks to the fear and anxieties of our time, how we live our lives. Constantly documenting things and putting them up on YouTube, sending people videos through e-mail - we felt it was very applicable to the way people feel now," the director said.[13]

The decapitated head of the Statue of Liberty was inspired by the poster of the 1981 film Escape from New York, which had shown the head lying in the streets in New York despite not appearing in the film itself. According to Reeves, "It's an incredibly provocative image. And that was the source that inspired [producer] J.J. [Abrams] to say, 'Now this would be an interesting idea for a movie.'"[14]

The film was titled Cloverfield from the beginning, but the title changed throughout production before it was finalized as the original title. Matt Reeves explained that the title was changed frequently due to the hype caused by the teaser trailer, "That excitement spread to such a degree that we suddenly couldn't use the name anymore. So we started using all these names like Slusho and Cheese. And people always found out what we were doing!" The director said that "Cloverfield" was the government's case designate for the monster, comparing the titling to that of the Manhattan Project. "And it's not a project per se. It's the way that this case has been designated. That's why that is on the trailer, and it becomes clearer in the film. It's how they refer to this phenomenon [or] this case," said the director.[15]

Visual effects supervisor Phil Tippett and his company Tippett Studio were enlisted to develop the visual effects for Cloverfield.[16] Since the visual effects were incorporated after filming, cast members had to react to a non-existent creature during scenes, only being familiar with early conceptual renderings of the beast.[17]

Marketing

Filmmakers decided to create a teaser trailer that would be a surprise in the light of commonplace media saturation, which they put together during the preparation stage of the production process. The teaser was then used as a basis for the film itself. Paramount Pictures encouraged the teaser to be released without a title attached, and the Motion Picture Association of America approved the move.[13] As Transformers showed high tracking numbers before its release in July 2007, the studio attached the teaser trailer for Cloverfield that showed the release date of January 18 2008 but not the title.[10] A second trailer was released on November 16, 2007, which confirmed the title.[18]

The studio had kept knowledge of the project secret from the online community, a cited rarity due to the presence of scoopers that follow upcoming films. The controlled release of information on the film has been observed as a risky strategy, which could succeed like The Blair Witch Project (1999) or disappoint like Snakes on a Plane (2006), the latter of which had generated online hype but failed to attract large audiences. Chad Hartigan of Exhibitor Relations Co. viewed the several issues with the potential of the film, including a lack of major stars, the underwhelming performance of Godzilla-style films in America, and the film's slated release in January, considered a "dumping ground for bad films".[19]

Plot speculation

The sudden appearance of the untitled trailer for Cloverfield fueled media speculation over the film's plot. USA Today reported the possibilities of the film being based on the works of H. P. Lovecraft, a live-action adaptation of Voltron, a new film about Godzilla, or a spin-off of the TV show Lost.[20] The Star Ledger also reported the possibility of the film being based on Lovecraft lore or Godzilla.[5] The Guardian also reported the possibility of a Lost spin-off,[21] while Time Out reported that the film was about an alien called The Parasite.[22] IGN also backed the possibility of the same premise, with The Parasite rumored to be a working title for the film.[15] Online, Slusho and Colossus had also been discussed as possible titles.[23] Entertainment Weekly also disputed reports that the film would be about a parasite or a colossal Asian robot such as Voltron.[11]

Visitors of the website Ain't It Cool News have pointed out 9/11 allusions based on the destruction in New York City such as the decapitated Statue of Liberty. The film has also drawn alternate reality game enthusiasts that have followed other viral marketing campaigns like those set up for the TV series Lost, the video game Halo 2, the Nine Inch Nails album Year Zero, and the upcoming Batman film The Dark Knight. Members of the forums at argn.com and unfiction.com have investigated the background of the film, with the "1-18-08" section at Unfiction generating over 7,700 posts in August 2007. The members have studied photographs on the film's official site, potentially related MySpace profiles, and the Comic-Con teaser poster for the film.[19]

Viral tie-ins

Puzzle websites containing Lovecraftian elements, such as Ethan Haas Was Right, were originally reported to be connected to the film.[20][21] On July 9 2007, producer J. J. Abrams stated that, while a number of websites were being developed to market the film, the only official site that had been found was 1-18-08.com.[24] At the site, a collection of time-coded photos are provided to visitors to piece together a series of events and interpret their meanings.

File:1-18-08.JPG
1-18-08.com Viral.

[25] As part of the viral marketing campaign, the drink Slusho! has served as a tie-in. The drink had previously appeared in producer Abrams' previous creation, the TV series Alias.[26] Viral websites for Slusho! and a Japanese drilling company were launched to add to the mythology of Cloverfield.[27] When Cloverfield was hosted at Comic-Con 2007, gray Slusho! t-shirts were distributed to attendees.[28] Fans who had registered at the Slusho! website for Cloverfield received e-mails of fictional sonar images prior to the film's release that showed a deep-sea creature heading toward Manhattan.[29]

Producer Bryan Burk explained the viral tie-in, "[It] was all done in conjunction with the studio... The whole experience in making this movie is very reminiscent [of] how we did Lost."[27] Director Matt Reeves described Slusho! as "part of the involved connectivity" with Abrams' Alias and that the drink represented a "meta-story" for Cloverfield. The director explained, "It's almost like tentacles that grow out of the film and lead, also, to the ideas in the film. And there's this weird way where you can go see the movie and it's one experience... But there's also this other place where you can get engaged where there's this other sort of aspect for all those people who are into that. [...] All the stories kind of bounce off one another and inform each other. But, at the end of the day, this movie stands on its own to be a movie. [...] The Internet sort of stories and connections and clues are, in a way, a prism and they're another way of looking at the same thing. To us, it's just another exciting aspect of the storytelling."[26]

Reception

Todd McCarthy of Variety called the film an "old-fashioned monster movie dressed up in trendy new threads", praising the special effects, "nihilistic attitude" and "post-9/11 anxiety overlay", but said, "In the end, [it's] not much different from all the marauding creature features that have come before it."[30] Michael Rechtshaffen of The Hollywood Reporter called it "chillingly effective", praising the effects and the film's "claustrophobic intensity." He said that though the characters "aren't particularly interesting or developed", there was "something refreshing about a monster movie that isn't filled with the usual suspects."[31]

References

  1. ^ "Cloverfield New Zealand Release Date". Paramount Pictures. Retrieved 2008-01-14.
  2. ^ "Cloverfield Australian Release Date". Paramount Pictures. Retrieved 2008-01-02.
  3. ^ "Cloverfield UK Release Date". Paramount Pictures. Retrieved 2007-12-18.
  4. ^ ""Cloverfield" a refreshing monster mashup". Reuters. Retrieved 2008-01-17.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Larry Carroll (2007-12-17). "'Cloverfield' Star Speaks At Last, Shedding Light On Secret J.J. Abrams Flick". MTV. Retrieved 2007-12-17. Cite error: The named reference "star" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  6. ^ Ben Kharakh (2007-10-29). "Carpooler's' TJ Miller Talks About JJ Abrams Role, Very Bad Porn & Tighty Whities". Starpulse.com. Retrieved 2007-10-29. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ a b Farrah Weinstein (2007-07-16). "Bait Balls of Fire". New York Post. Retrieved 2007-07-17. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ a b "Lizzy Caplan: The Meanest Girl in Hollywood?". BlackBook Magazine. 2007-11-15. Retrieved 2007-11-16. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ Alex Billington (2007-07-26). "Comic-Con Live: Paramount Panel - Star Trek, Indiana Jones IV, and More…". FirstShowing.net. Retrieved 2007-09-17. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ^ a b c Borys Kit (2007-07-06). "Paramount rolls in the 'Cloverfield'". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2007-07-06. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  11. ^ a b Jeff Jensen (2007-07-26). "J.J.'s Mystery Movie: Secrets revealed!". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2007-07-26. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  12. ^ Lisa Blake (2007-08-22). "Bases harnessed for double duty". Variety. Retrieved 2007-08-27. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  13. ^ a b Ryan Rotten (2007-12-14). "EXCL: Cloverfield Director Speaks!". ShockTillYouDrop.com. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  14. ^ Scott Collura (2007-12-14). "Exclusive: Cloverfield Director Speaks! Part Two". IGN. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  15. ^ a b Scott Collura (2007-12-14). "Exclusive: Cloverfield Director Speaks!". IGN. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) Cite error: The named reference "ign" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  16. ^ Ryan Ball (2007-09-27). "Tippett Making Abrams' Monster". Animation Magazine. Retrieved 2007-12-06. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  17. ^ Ryan Rotten (2008-01-02). "EXCL: Michael Stahl-David Talks Cloverfield Experience". ShockTillYouDrop.com. Retrieved 2008-01-08. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  18. ^ Olly Richards (2007-11-19). "Exclusive: The New Cloverfield Trailer". Empire. Retrieved 2007-11-19. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  19. ^ a b Omar L. Gallaga (2007-08-03). "To market a movie, no name is needed; just create mystery and some Web buzz". Austin American-Statesman. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  20. ^ a b Anthony Breznican (2007-07-09). "Mystifying trailer transforms marketing". USA Today. Retrieved 2007-07-16. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  21. ^ a b "Trailer for Abrams film lost on moviegoers". The Guardian. 2007-07-11. Retrieved 2007-07-26. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  22. ^ Chris Tilly (2007-07-11). "What is 'Cloverfield'?". Time Out. Retrieved 2007-07-26. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  23. ^ Greg Morago (2007-08-22). "Our summer of mystery ads". Daily Press. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  24. ^ Harry Knowles (2007-07-09). "JJ Abrams drops Harry a Line on all this 1-18-08 stuff!". Ain't It Cool News. Retrieved 2007-07-09. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  25. ^ Rodney Chester (2007-08-11). "Movie codenamed Cloverfield next blockbuster". The Courier-Mail. Retrieved 2007-08-13. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  26. ^ a b Silas Lesnick (2007-12-14). "IESB EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Cloverfield Director Matt Reeves!". IESB.net. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  27. ^ a b Tara DiLullo Bennett (2007-12-17). "Producer Talks Cloverfield". Sci Fi Wire. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  28. ^ Larry Carroll (2007-07-27). "Comic-Con: J.J. Abrams' Secret Project And 'The Dark Knight' Go Guerrilla With Marketing Tactics". MTV. Retrieved 2007-12-22. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ^ Will Pavia (2008-01-02). "The cloak-and-dagger approach to hype". The Australian. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  30. ^ Todd McCarthy (2008-01-16). "Cloverfield review". Variety. Retrieved 2008-01-17. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  31. ^ Michael Rechtshaffen (2008-01-17). "Bottom Line: It's "The Blair Godzilla Project"--and that's a compliment". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2008-01-17. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)

External links

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