Cloverfield (2008) | Sci-Fi Saturdays

19

Or as some call it, American Kaiju!

Cloverfield is a cornerstone film in the found-footage genre, putting audiences right in the middle of the destruction of New York City. It also received a lot of viral publicity for its marketing efforts. But just what is the film about?

First Impressions

This trailer looks like a home video, depicting a farewell party for a guy named Rob. Various characters talk to Rob by looking directly into the camera. Suddenly the lights flicker and the ground shakes. News reports indicate an earthquake. People look outside and see an explosion in the distance in the heart of New York City. Debris rains around them including the head of the Statue of Liberty. Just what the heck is Cloverfield about?

Presented below is the trailer for the film.

The Fiction of The Film

The film opens with a tacked-on header proclaiming the following is property of the Department of Defense containing footage retrieved from Central Park, called “incident sIte: US-447.” The footage begins on April 27 at 6:42 in the morning as Rob (Rob Hawkins) films himself waking up Beth (Odette Yustman) in her Columbus Circle apartment, where they decide to take in a day at Coney Island. The footage then jumps ahead to May 22 at 6:43 pm with Rob’s brother Jason (Mike Vogel) filming his girlfriend Lily (Jessica Lucas) as they head to a bon voyage party for Rob, who will be heading to Japan for work. At the party, Jason hands the camera to Hud (TJ Miller) telling him to document the event and get testimonials from everyone.

Beth arrives with a new man, Travis (Ben Feldman) which seems to upset Rob. Rob is also upset when he finds out that the footage Hud is recording is taping over his trip to Coney Island with Beth. HUd tries to take a testimonial from Beth, but Rob takes her into the hall where they argue. Beth leaves with Travis suddenly.  Jason takes Rob out to the fire escape to make him feel better when an earthquake shakes the apartment, and power in the city goes out. The partygoers all run to the rooftop in time to see a large explosion miles away in Midtown Manhattan, spewing debris towards them. Outside the building, the head of the Statue of Liberty crashes into the street.

Rob, Jason, Lily, and Hud hide in a bodega as a giant dust cloud goes by. Rob claims he saw something in it. They exit the store after things clear and find Marlena (Lizzy Caplan), another partygoer in shock, who they take with them as they begin to evacuate the island with others. The police are directing people across the Brooklyn Bridge when a giant monster rises out of the water and uses its tail to smash the bridge. Jason is killed but the others escape back into Manhattan. Rob gets a call from Beth but his phone battery dies. They enter an electronic store to get a replacement while Hud films television news reports of destruction around the city. Outside the military rushes by the group as Rob gets a voicemail that Beth is trapped in her apartment.

Rob becomes adamant that they need to head into Midtown to save Beth. They head into a subway station just as the military engages the creature, designated in the footage as “Cloverfield.” From the station, Rob decides the safest way into Midtown is to walk the dark subway tunnels. Hud speculates on the origins of the creature when a huge number of rats pass them. Rob shows Hud how to turn on the camera’s night vision setting just before they are attacked by wolf-sized parasites. Marlena is bitten in the attack. They escape through another station into Bloomingdale’s department store which holds a military command center.

Marlena begins to bleed from her eyes and the military whisk her away as a bite risk. Inside a triage tent, Marlena’s body explodes. Rob tries to get one of the military leaders to listen to him about his girlfriend being alive. Staff Sgt. Pryce (Billy Brown) tells them he can’t do anything to help. He warns them that the Hammer Down protocol will be enacted and that the last available helicopter will be extracting survivors at 6 am. Rob leads Lily and Hud to Beth’s building which is partially collapsed onto a neighboring building. They climb the stairs of the neighboring building, hopping across to the roof of Beth’s.

Inside they find Beth impaled through the shoulder on a piece of rebar. Freeing her, they make their way back to Central Park as the Cloverfield monster heads towards them. At the park, Lilly is placed on the lead helicopter, while Rob, Beth, and Hud take the second one. From the air, they see the monster being bombed, but it rises up and knocks the second helicopter down, where it crashes in the park. Hud goes to retrieve the dropped camera and is eaten by the creature. Rob and Beth take the camera and hide under a bridge in Central Park, each recording the other’s final testimonials. At 6:42 am on May 23, the bombing of New York starts, and the tape goes dead. The final footage is from Beth and Rob on the ferris wheel at Coney Island from April 27. Something crashes into the ocean, unseen by the pair as Beth tells Rob that she had a good day.

“If you found this tape, I mean if you’re watching this right now, then you probably know more about it than I do.” – Rob

History in the Making

Cloverfield is much more of a horror film and probably belongs in the chunk of sci-fi monster movies that I reviewed last month during 31 Days of Horror. And maybe its science-fiction credibility is a little shaky as well. But it does fall in line with some of the best movies about giant monsters. What makes the film unique is its presentation as a found-footage film. Cloverfield was not the first nor the last film of this filming style, but it is one of the most popular examples of the genre. Found footage, as the name suggests, purports to be footage that is documentary in nature and is being presented to the audience as real. Horror films have used this to great effect with Cannibal Holocaust being the first of its kind. Most fans of the horror genre are more familiar with The Blair Witch Project, which reinvigorated the genre in 1999, leading to dozens of more low-budget (and sometimes studio productions) such as the Paranormal Activity and Rec franchises. Sci-fi found-footage films also include Apollo 18 and Project Almanac. The immediacy and first-person perspective of the genre lends itself to horror and sci-fi/horror stories by putting the audience into the story. Cloverfield takes place over a 12-hour period, with a film that is no longer than a standard DV tape available at the time.

While Cloverfield presents an interesting survival film for its characters, the thing that people seem to remember about the film is that JJ Abrams is involved. Abrams was already a successful and well-known creator/writer/director for the television shows Felicity, Alias, and Lost. He had written or co-written six films (including Armageddon) and had just released his directorial debut with Mission: Impossible III. He had yet to reboot the Star Trek franchise or give his take on Star Wars. Cloverfield was one of his early producing credits but his style is all over the film and its marketing. Abrams is a fan of “puzzle boxes” and created a buzz of mystery around the production and release of the film. Early trailers teased footage with no credits or titles attached to it. Viral websites created strange links to the film, playing up the reality of the situation. This was a film that people were definitely talking about. Abrams surrounded himself with friends to write and direct the film. This was Drew Goddard’s first motion picture, but he had worked with Abrams on multiple episodes of Alias and Lost, as well as writing episodes for Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel series. He would go on to write and direct The Cabin in the Woods for Whedon and adapt The Martian and the upcoming Project Hail Mary, both based on novels by Andy Weir. Directing the film was Matt Reeves which was his second film. He had started directing episodes of Abrams’ Felicity and would go on to direct Dawn of and War for The Planet of the Apes, as well as the most recent caped crusader film, The Batman. Together they produced an interesting and engaging film about what would happen if some giant creature got loose in New York City.

Genre-fication

The articles in this series have looked at a wide range of films that might be considered sci-fi adjacent. Cloverfield is close, but I think it has a strong sci-fi lineage in its genes. While there is not any concrete evidence about where the monster comes from, it’s heavily implied in the final closing shot that it may come from another planet (or at least an experiment in space), which may be the extent of its science-fiction elements were it not for its inspiration. The film is an American version of Godzilla, with its rampaging beast, destroying a major city, setting the scene with characters caught up in the destruction rather than being filmed from outside. Godzilla fits the mold much more strongly than Cloverfield in the creation of the monster which is primarily due to human negligence and atomic testing. Was the creature here created in some fashion by humans, or are they only the victims in this film? With the action taking place in New York, thoughts of King Kong also spring to mind, as the monster swats down helicopters the way the great ape swats down airplanes. And then of course there is the homage to the movie poster of Escape from New York. That poster reportedly influenced the production with the head of the Statue of Liberty rolling down a New York street. But loose references to previous sci-fi films do not a science-fiction film make.

Cloverfield stands more firmly in the horror genre, both with its creatures–big and small–and its depictions of the destruction of an American city. The creature, nicknamed Clover, is only tangentially seen, never giving audiences a “hero shot,” as it were. Its random attacks through the city provide that gnawing terror of the unknown. Add to that the parasitic small creatures that fall off the giant monster. These smaller, yet still bigger than a dog, creatures are much scarier since they can get into spaces that people might normally feel safe inside. Plus their bite seems to cause people to bleed from the eyes minutes before they pop, like some meaty water balloon. But what the film does first and foremost for many is to bring back the visceral imagery that many watched on television, and which some experienced, during the 9/11 attacks on the self-same city. The chaos and frenetic energy of the unsteady camera shots strike an eerie chord for audiences that have ever lived through something similar.

Societal Commentary

Surprisingly Cloverfield fails to do the one thing that many films in this subgenre do. It doesn’t create a character that is out for themselves. Someone that the audience despises and roots against. These opportunist characters often show up in disaster films to provide a foil to the protagonist. It’s Larry in Empire of the Ants or Yon-suk in Train to Busan. Jerky people that audiences are happy to watch get eaten. The characters of Cloverfield are all just trying to survive the destruction of New York. It has no antagonists to speak of, except for the creature. Rob is not necessarily the smartest character, but he at least is trying to help others. Lily ends up being the only one of the main characters to (presumably) survive. She takes off in the first helicopter never to be heard from again.

The Science in The Fiction

Hud offers two separate hypotheses as to where the creature is from. He brings up a fish found in Madagascar that “they thought had been extinct for centuries.” That it “erupted from an ocean trench.” He is referring to the coelacanth, which was thought to have been extinct for approximately 70 million years. This idea comes from Godzilla’s origin as a dinosaur-like creature that mutated from atomic radiation. His second thought, and one which the movie seems to suggest may be closer to the truth, is that Clover is “from another planet and it flew here.” This makes much more sense, at least in terms of films like this. How many of Godzilla’s enemies came from another planet? Most of them, right? Audiences may miss this moment at the end of the film, and I admit it passed me by in my first viewing. In the final shot as Rob and Beth are sitting in the ferris wheel with the camera pointed toward the ocean, a small object can be seen crashing into the ocean on the right side of the frame. This was probably easier to see in the theaters than on screens at home. But since that footage occurs about a month before the attack, it’s a good idea. But what if Hud is actually correct on both accounts? Clover is a creature from outer space that crashes into the ocean and then erupts out of the water near Liberty Island, tearing the head off the statue and flinging it into Midtown. It’s one of the least crazy theories from a JJ Abrams project.

The Final Frontier

While the movie opens with Rob being the man behind the camera, which switches to Jason for the later scenes, Hud eventually becomes the cameraman for the remainder of the film. This is a subtle, and clever, usage of a character named Hud. In first-person video games, the HUD (capitalized) is an acronym for Heads Up Display. It is the gamer’s interface to the world and provides commentary, clues, and details about what’s going on. Hud provides similar unseen commentary from behind the camera, usually some joke or ill-conceived thought. He suggests that a flaming homeless guy might jump out at them in the subway, and how scary that would be. Of course, the others tell him immediately to shut up.

Cloverfield was followed by two sequels, 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016) and The Cloverfield Paradox (2018). They are films that take place in the same universe, utilizing elements from this film, but are entirely different genres and styles. They are both interesting uses of taking unrelated scripts and tweaking them to fit into a universe of monsters and other strange goings on. There was even a rumor that Abrams’ Super 8 was going to be part of the Cloverfield universe, but that never materialized.

For audiences that are not made ill by shaky camera movements, Cloverfield is a better take on the found-footage film. Its use of camcorder footage makes sense in that it includes the setup sequences at the party, which both build the foundation of the character relationships, as well as set up the calm before the storm. It provides enough surprises along the way and goes all out in creating a melancholy ending, where all the main characters die. It also seamlessly blends multiple takes from video footage into what appears to be extended shots that include visual effects of creatures and destruction. Next week, Sci-Fi Saturdays gets back to more traditional sci-fi fare with a superhero-like film.

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