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To summarise ‘Cloverfield‘ - this is a film which will REALLY divide audiences. And I’d probably bet more people will loathe it than love it!

And there’s a good (and by no means) superficial reason for this divide - the stable tool of Hollywood in recent times has been “the shakey cam”. We’ve all seen it used in ‘The Blair Witch Project‘ and to a more professional extent, Paul Greengrass exploited it in ‘The Bourne Supremacy‘ and ‘The Bourne Ultimatum‘.

It has always been a sore point with audiences - it’s never bothered me to be honest. But as it becomes more and more common with portraying action scenes and car chases / crashes (see ‘Bourne’ examples), audiences are becoming more and more peeved with it.

This is where the audience for ‘Cloverfield’ will likely be divided. It takes the idea of “shakey-cam” and spreads it out over 85 minutes. A large percentage of cinema-goer’s will do one (or all) of the following:

• Give up on the film half-way suffering from a case of nausea.
• Give up on the film as they can’t track exactly what’s going on in action scenes
• If you’re in the same cinema I’m in, start giggling / chatting on their mobiles and generally ruin the film for everyone else (note to self: write a blog post complaining about this later).

And unfortunately for them, there’s more than enough innovation in the film than I’ve seen from an action movie (or “monster movie”) in a long long time. The movie (in my eyes anyways) oozed of innovation and something special and different and here’s where I shall start discussing details of the plotline so click ‘Show’ below if you’ve seen the film.

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It has a very solid crew behind it - it was directed by Matt Reeves (who created the very under-rated TV show ‘Felicity‘), produced by “golden boy” JJ Abrams (co-creator of ‘Lost’, creator of ‘Alias‘ and whose next directorial effort will be ‘Star Trek‘ this coming Christmas) and was written by ‘Angel‘, ‘Alias’ and ‘Lost’ writer Drew Goddard.

The cast are all practically unknowns… and to be perfectly honest, they’re not particularly standout performances either. But running around and acting scared for 85 minutes will never stretch your “acting muscles” - but no doubt, many members will get their chance in more demanding roles after the success of ‘Cloverfield’.

I could talk about the film in detail as it’s quite an interesting film, but as I said at the top of the post, it will really divide audiences and people who enjoy it will discuss elements of it in detail while people who didn’t still suffer motion-sickness. Oh, and by way, I’m joking by “pigeon-holeing” people who didn’t like it exclusively to those who couldn’t bear shakey-cam, the film has more than a fair amount of flaws. But personally weighing the pros and cons up, I enjoyed it a lot (probably more than most action movies of the last year or two). But that doesn’t mean I would like to see a ‘Cloverfield’-esque movie every Summer.. but it’ll no doubt happen now that it’s proved successful.

Rating:

Juno

Plot Outline: Faced with an unplanned pregnancy, an offbeat young woman makes an unusual decision regarding her unborn child.

Review: Truly a stupendous film in every respect - performances, music, script and direction!

Director Jason Reitman (son of long-time director Ivan Reitman and director of 2005’s ‘Thank You For Smoking‘) does an absolutely sterling job in bringing all those elements together in this unique but very charming film. Performances from all involved (especially Ellen Page as the lead, Juno) are stupendous. It’s definitely a career-making role for her and here’s hoping for a bright future in Hollywood as she carries the film extremely well given the subject matter.

It deals with the subject of abortion and teenage pregnancy quite effectively - it never tip-toes around them and is quite frank about both.

The soundtrack is fantastic also and features music from The Kinks, Buddy Holly, The Velvet Underground, Sonic Youth, The Moldy Peaches and Belle & Sebastian (to name but a few). The score is also excellent and was composed mainly by Kimya Dawson (member of The Moldy Peaches).

I can really see it as a film which will truly divide audiences though (similar to 2006’s ‘Little Miss Sunshine‘), I’d expect an equal amount of people hailing it as original and truly moving as people who just loath it and / or wonder what all the fuss was about. For me, it was probably the best film I’ve seen in the last 6 - 8 months - it was truly original, enjoyable and was a breath of fresh air among the sleuth of sub-par sequels being released out of Hollywood in the past few months.

Much recommended!

Rating:

Rocket Science

Plot Outline: Looking for answers to life’s big questions, a stuttering boy joins his high school debate team.

Review: As a long-time stutterer myself, this was quite an interesting to watch - simply due to the fact I was really somewhat hoping it would as true to life as some of my own experiences. And it turns out it (somewhat) was.

Clearly the director (Jeffrey Blitz) must have at least researched the subject (or “disorder” if you look at it that way) as a lot of the mannerisms and experiences by the lead in the film echo some of my own experiences. One example being in which the lead (played brillantly by Reece Thompson) practices saying exactly what he wants for lunch on his way to school - I was never that neurotic about it all but I do understand where the character is coming from.

Onto the actual film, it’s clearly an indie film. It’s got a clearly low budget, cast of unrecognizable actors (to me anyways) and as far from a commercial Hollywood story as you would expect from a first-time filmmaker. But all these elements work in it’s charm

The performances are mostly very impressive - especially from Reece Thompson as the lead and Anna Kendrick (as Ginny Ryerson). What I enjoyed mostly was the fact that it made the characters all visibly flawed which distracted from the lead’s prominent speech impediment. The script can be very witty, although equally amateurish at times

One thing I will say about the film is it’s a slow-burner, and for those of you who are looking for a happy ending which resolves everything which has gone before it - this one probably isn’t for you!

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