CLOVERFIELD
1932

Sorry about this one. But it is the last monster movie made so we need to look at it.

Despite the press releases and other advertising that we finally had an “American monster” Apparently the film makers never saw Beast from 20,000 Fathoms – which even the Japanese saw and knew about!!

This “Blair Witch meets Godzilla” again alters the underlying meaning of the monster.

Cloverfield 2008 - Sounds like a phone number.

Cloverfield (the exit ramp the film maker uses when he drives to his California office) is the most recent entry into the monster movie category. The makers of the film claimed they wanted America to have its own monster. Apparently they forgot about King Kong and the Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (even though both are cited in the film). Apparently they must have meat a native grown beast since neither Kong nor the Beast hold US citizenship. Of course if they really meant "American" as opposed to "New York monsters" ("Geez ain't we got enough of those in NY already") then they must have forgotten abut Them!, The Beginning of the End and a few other home grown monsters. I suspect they may have forgotten all this by the time they made the film, since this beastie arrives rom outer space (according to one of the film makers - suffering from separation anxiety. "Nothing" he says is a frightening as a big thing that is out of control. I mean really - it is bad enough to have to WATCH these movies never mind read the garbage the film makers spew out as pseudo intellectual gobbledy gook (to be polite about it).

The film has been referred to as Godzilla Meets Blair Witch, and the film getting mostly the bad genes. You will be able to see why rather quickly in the film

The film's use of a hand held camera throughout, and the idea that people learn about what happened through a recording harkens back to the most successful Blair Witch Project. The film also seems to have borrowed its highly successful marketing strategy from them as well.

AFTER THE FILM

The film runs (mercifully) about 85 minutes - the length of DV tape (too bad they didn't use DVD cam - that runs only about 55 minutes.

The film is presented as a tape turned over to the Dept. of Defense after blowing up Manhattan to get rid of the creature, although how the camera and tape survived the blasts in anybody guess. However, in the time honored tradition of Cannibal Holocaust (1980), The Last Broadcast (1998) and Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield goes for the hand held camera (perhaps even in a salute the the you-tube generation).

The text which deals largely with people having a party for someone leaving for Japan (Hi there Godzilla!). They discover Manhattan has been invaded by a giant monster which relentless marches from the Battery to Bloomingdales somehow damaging the buildings near Central Park before anyone gets there. Ultimately, the military destroys (perhaps) the beast and the critters that spring off it and bite people and make them explode under the cover name "Cloverfield".

SUB TEXT and EXPLOITATION FILMS

The thing reflects the fears people had at the time – Cloverfield exploits them.

Having seen Blacula and thought about the kind of exploitation that went on with that film, Cloverfield seems involved in exploiting peoples fears (and hence attracting them into the movie houses),

While it is painfully obvious that the subtext of the film has to do with terrorist and the 9/11 attack on NY, some people have felt that the film plays on the fears of the people about another such attack. The film clearly sows its anti-American villain by having him knock off the head of the Statue of Liberty.

One can easily spot the "parasites" as the covert splinter groups that break of the main body to cause even more havoc.

There are clear parallels between Gojira and Cloverfield in that both monsters seem to deal with an attack on a major City that represent an attack by another group. In effect The Cloverfield monster = Godzilla and the Americans = the terrorists. Ooops, sorry about that.

Any resemblance after that seems not to have been coincidental but deliberately avoid. The complexity of the problems of the social responsibility of scientists and the triangle between the three main young characters has no counterpart with the vacuous people floating aimless through the farewell party in NY.

The film makes a great attempt (and to some degree succeeds) in looking suspiciously like the amateur footage shot during the collapse of the Trade Towers.