“10 Cloverfield Lane” was a mystery wrapped in an enigma slathered with clever marketing. A low-budget sci-fi/thriller that began as an original story about people trapped in an underground bunker, it morphed into a sorta-sequel to “Cloverfield,” a successful 2008 monsters-from-space flick produced by J.J. Abrams.
If you’re looking for continuity between the two cinematic universes, keep looking. But as a standalone piece of filmmaking, it’s decently engrossing.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays Michelle, a woman going through personal turmoil right as the Earth seems to be experiencing some cataclysmic troubles she hears about on her car radio. Then a truck runs her off the road, she’s knocked out and wakes up in a creepy cellar.
The proprietor is Howard (John Goodman), a twitchy conspiracy theory sort who built the elaborate bunker in fear of Russian/Chinese attacks. As far as he’s concerned, that’s what has happened, and the poisonous air (he says) will be unbreathable for at least a year or two. So the three of them – John Gallagher Jr. plays Howard’s dimwitted wingman – have to just settle in for the long haul.
Things grow more tense as the days pass, with Howard attempting to assert patriarchal control over their little ersatz family. Michelle’s skepticism about Howard’s story festers, leading to escape attempts and confrontations.
It’s a fun movie to watch, even as you can hear the gears of the storytelling process grinding away. “10 Cloverfield Lane” contains few surprises, but it does what it does well enough.
Bonus features are a little skimpy; the DVD contains exactly none. The Blu-ray version has a feature-length commentary track by director Dan Trachtenberg and Abrams plus 30 minutes of behind-the-scenes footage from the production.
For the record, I’ve adored all the Star Wars movies -- even the much-maligned “prequel” trilogy. So when I say that I liked Episode VII, “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” about as much as I did “Star Wars: The Phantom Menace,” is not the intended insult most people think.
I would put both near the bottom of any ranking of the franchise. Which is to say I think they’re still very good science fiction/fantasy films. But their flaws are more glaring than the others. I won’t belabor those of “Phantom Menace,” as they’re well-known -- kooky trade war plot, Jar Jar buffoonery, etc.
The biggest problem with “TFA” is that it’s not terribly original. It’s essentially a reboot of the first film: a nobody on a desert planet rises to glory through the mystical Force; bad guy in a black mask; cantina of bizarre aliens; roguish smuggler Han Solo sets aside cynicism to join the rebels; world-destroying space station threatens the galaxy; plans for its destruction are embedded in a perky little robot.
Director J.J. Abrams, who co-wrote the script with Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt, seemed more intent on making a greatest hits compilation for the fans than a logical and satisfying extension of the Star Wars saga.
Like: how is it that 30 years after its defeat, the Empire has reconstituted itself into the First Order, complete with Stormtrooper armies and a new Death Star (er, Starkiller Base). What were Leia (Carrie Fisher) and the Galactic Senate doing all this time?
The setup is that Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) was training a new generation of Jedi Knights when he was betrayed by his chief pupil, Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), who was seduced to the dark side despite his good parentage. (Which I’ll not reveal here, for the 0.2% of readers who didn’t see the movie in theaters and are still innocent of the Internet.)
The plans for Starkiller Base come into the possession of Rey (Daisy Ridley), a mysterious scavenger living the quiet life on barren Jakku, and Finn (John Boyega), a Stormtrooper who betrayed his dark conditioning. They meet up with Han Solo (Harrison Ford), searching for his long-lost ship the Millennium Falcon, as everyone scrambles to get the plans before First Order wipes out the resistance.
It’s a delightful space adventure, with plenty of dogfights, scary critters and lightsaber duels. Kylo Ren is a new iteration of villain – self-aware, unbalanced, petulant. Rey remains an enigma, including to herself, but there are hints of great destiny ahead. The weakest character is Finn, who transforms overnight from emotionless soldier to hootin’ rebel cheerleader without even the barest of emotional journeys. (Boyega’s often over-the-top performance doesn’t help, either.)
But it’s easy to overlook the failings in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” because they don’t detract from the immediacy of the thrills. I’m just hoping future films in the series will harbor a little more ambition.
Bonus features are pretty good, mostly represented in seven featurettes that touch on special effects, John Williams’ musical score, building BB-8, etc. There’s also a lengthy making-of documentary, “Secrets of The Force Awakens: A Cinematic Journey,” plus several deleted scenes.
So people are excited about "10 Cloverfield Lane" because it was made in ultra secrecy and has been touted as a sorta-sequel to "Cloverfield," the 2008 found-footage hit thriller about giant monsters attacking the Earth, both of which were produced by "Star Wars" and "Star Trek" wunderkind J.J. Abrams (though he didn't write or direct either).
It's about people stuck in an underground shelter after some kind of attack has rendered the air above toxic. John Goodman plays the guy who built the place and runs it like a dictator, Mary Elizabeth Winstead is his guest/captive, and we're trying to figure out if his story is legit or he just kidnapped her.
The movie is reasonably enjoyable and engaging as a popcorn flick, though it often thinks it's being coy when really it telegraphs its punches pretty badly. Start with the title treatment in the opening credits, where the L's at the beginning and end of "Cloverfield" extend upward and downward, respectively becoming the "1" in 10 and the "L" in Lane.
"See?" the movie nudges us. "I'm the next chapter."
So how much of a sequel is this film, really? My normal inclination is not to blab too much about a movie that so obviously cherishes its secrets. But I feel like the filmmakers and promoters are engaging in some major trickery-dickery here.
So I'll just give a straight answer: Not so much.
"Lane" started as a completely original script by John Campbell and Matt Stuecken called "The Cellar," and over time got slathered with some Cloverfield sauce. Damien Chazelle of "Whiplash" was brought in to punch up the script. Dan Trachtenberg, who has various credits for technical work, makes his debut in the director's chair.
There are thematic similarities between the two films, but there's little continuity in the stories. It's questionable if they even take place in the same fictional universe.
Let's be blunt: The title is more about marketing than fidelity to an artistic impulse. "Cloverfield" was a low-budget ($25 million) science fiction film that made a bunch of money. "10 Cloverfield Lane" is an ultra-low-budget movie ($5 million) that falls more in the horror/mystery territory, which typically generates little buzz or ticket sales. It's the sort of movie that comes out in March and is usually quickly forgotten. Now it's guaranteed to have a big opening at the least.
I don't begrudge Abrams & Co. for a little chicanery to pump interest in their movie. But I'm certainly not going to go along with the ruse.
Winstead is the best thing about the movie. She's a wonderful actress who, like Brie Larson, has toiled from a young age doing often spectacular work ("Smashed") in movies that don't reach the public consciousness. She plays Michelle, a typical cinematic heroine: smart, independent, kind of disconnected from others.
As the story opens she's just walked out on her boyfriend, leaving behind her house keys and an engagement ring, but taking a bottle of single-malt scotch. While driving she hears some stuff on the radio about mass blackouts in cities, then a truck smashes into her and knocks her car down a hill.
She wakes up in a blank grey room, a brace on her knee, blood matted on her head and an IV in her arm. She's been stripped of most of her clothes, and the brace is handcuffed to the wall. Needless to say, she's freaking out. But Michelle manages to retrieve her clothes and phone from a pile in the corner, showing us she's resourceful and tough. Alas, no cell signal.
Then Howard (Goodman) shows up, and she's obviously thinking about twisted torture/rape/death scenarios. Howard, burly and bearded and wearing a sidearm, gives her few reasons for comfort. He's not overtly threatening, but issues dark warnings about her being thankful for his generosity and hospital. I saved your life, Howard insists.
Eventually Michelle earns tiny portions of freedom, and knowledge. They're in an elaborate underground bunker Howard built over the last few years. He's an ex-Navy man who worked on satellites and has some kooky ideas about alien invaders. The Martians' weapons will make the Russian arsenal look like sticks and stones, he insists.
One of the film's problems is that Howard's paranoia and malevolence should gradually grow over time, but the filmmakers turn him up to Full Kray-Kray right away. He's got the squirrelly stare, hand fidgets, sudden rages, etc. This serves to spoil impending surprises, which I'll not share.
Anyway, Howard insists the air is poison and they'll have to stay for a year or two -- at least. He's got plenty of provisions, an "aquaponic" air filtration system, some DVDs and VHS tapes, puzzles and board games.
There's also a sidekick: Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.), a young local yokel who helped Howard build the shelter. He's got a busted shoulder received (he says) while forcing his way into the shelter after the attacks started, which took the form of biblical flashes of light far off.
Pretty soon a dynamic establishes itself: Michelle doubts Howard's story, even after Emmett verifies parts of it; Howard's behavior becomes even more strange and volatile -- he insists that the trio not touch each other, for instance; and Michelle recruits Emmett, a dim ex-jock type, into launching an escape plan.
I'll stop here with the plot description, since that's all you need to know and this is usually the dullest stretch of any film review.
Random aside: I was bothered that Winstead's character spends the entire time in the shelter barefoot, while Emmett and Howard always wear clunky shitkicker boots. We see her own shoes in the pile of clothes when she first wakes up, so how come she never puts them on? Is this a visual token of her subservience and vulnerability? A comment on Howard's archaic views on gender roles? A nod to the foot fetish demographic?
"10 Cloverfield Lane" is a pretty decent standalone film. It's got some solid scares and chills, along with a few dead spots. It's 105 minutes long and would have been better at 95.
Director J. J. Abrams self-consciously channels Steven Spielberg in "Super 8," an ode to Gen-X childhood and 1970s filmmaking built around a sense of wonderment. It's the story of a group of boys in small-town 1979 Ohio, who are shooting an amateur zombie movie when a real-life disaster descends upon their community.
The plot is fairly predictable -- if you haven't figured out what the threat is by the time the military starts invading with soldiers, you must've been asleep. But Abrams, who also penned the screenplay, manages to convincingly evoke and specific time and place of his own imagining.
Here, 13-year-olds talk and act exactly like real preteens do, not the glossy, whitewashed versions we're used to in mainstream films. Joe (Joel Courtney), the shy kid who does the special effects make-up, is the main character but brash Charles (Riley Griffiths), the director of the picture-within-a-picture, calls the shots. He's obsessed with putting "production value" into their flicks, and comes up with the idea of casting a girl (a girl!) in their movie.
Thus enters Alice, the rebellious gal at school, played by Elle Fanning in a game-changing performance. Things get rolling with the derailing of a locomotive, in a scene that makes the train crash in "The Fugitive" look wimpy. The mysterious behavior of one of their schoolteachers and other odd occurrences takes the story into serious "Twilight Zone" territory.
Along the way, Joe will have to deal with his distant father (Kyle Chandler), a deputy sheriff who's broken up about the recent death of his wife.
What it lacks in originality, "Super 8" makes up for with spunk and a genuine heart.
Extra material is quite good. If you go for the DVD version, you'll get a feature-length commentary by Abrams and key crew members, and two making-of featurettes.
Opt for the Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, and you'll add six more featurettes, including ones on the excellent musical score by Michael Giacchino and the tradition of 8mm filmmaking. There's also a deconstruction of the train crash scene, deleted scenes and a digital copy of the film.
"Super 8" is nostalgia filmmaking. It is a pretty self-conscious attempt by Generation Xer J.J. Abrams to recreate the sort of movies he fell in love with as a kid -- specifically, the early films of Steven Spielberg.
The fact that Spielberg, a Baby Boomer, served as executive producer of this movie has the potential to turn the entire endeavor into a massive exercise in narcissism. The musical score by Michael Giacchino even seems composed to mimic the trills and crescendos of John Williams, who's scored every Spielberg film.
And yet, even as writer/director Abrams seems bound and determined to follow a template of another's choosing, "Super 8" still has a sprightly life of its own. If it deliberately recalls films from the 1970s and '80s -- "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial" and "The Goonies" especially -- then it also powerfully evokes its own distinct sense of time and place.
The centerpiece of the story is a gaggle of kids who seem less written for the screen than conjured out of memory from 1979. They talk, look and act like 13-year-olds stuck between the traditional upbringing of the 1950s and the dawn of the pop culture information age.
Much mystery has surrounded the plot of "Super 8," although after watching it that shroud seems silly and unnecessary. Any halfway cognizant filmgoer will guess what the secret is just a few minutes in.
The movie's appeal is less what it does, and more how it goes about doing it -- with heart, imagination and genuine emotional attachment.
The set-up is that a group of boys are filming a zombie movie in small-town Lillian, Ohio. It's been an off-and-on project for the entire school year, but now that summer's here director and ringleader Charles (Riley Griffiths) wants to finish in time to enter in a Cleveland amateur film festival. He also stumbles upon the brilliant idea of inviting Alice (Elle Fanning), the pretty rebellious girl from their class, to play a role.
Charles is always mouthing off about needing "production value" in his movie, so they all sneak out at midnight to shoot at the train station with a locomotive roaring by. Except, the train derails -- in a spectacular, heart-grabbing sequence that makes the train scene in "The Fugitive" look tame -- setting off a wave of mysterious and alarming events.
Without giving too much away, here are some snippets:
One of their teachers is involved, and they learn more about his dark past beyond his habit of confiscating contraband from students and never giving it back.
A small army of Air Force soldiers gradually take over the town, for reasons they claim are benevolent but increasingly are not.
Eventually, the entire town becomes a war zone and the kids are caught up in the middle, trying to solve the riddle and keep their necks.
The main character is sort of in the background for awhile, but eventually Joe (a terrific Joel Courtney) emerges. He's a shy kid who builds models and does the makeup for Charles' movie, and is flabbergasted when the exotic Alice seems to return his attention.
Joe's relationship with his father, the sheriff's right-hand-deputy, is strained by the recent loss of his mother in an accident at the steel foundry. His dad (Kyle Chandler) wants him to go to baseball camp for the summer, in an obvious ploy to get the boy out of his hair. But when things go south in town, Joe's dad learns how to step up.
I'm still sort of amazed at how much I liked "Super 8," since I pretty much knew in advance everything that was going to happen. And it's a shame that the other boys in the group -- ably played by Ryan Lee, Zach Mills and Gabriel Basso -- never really get fleshed out.
