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==Plot==
==Plot==
{{plot|date=October 2009}} <!-- see WP:Filmplot -->
{{plot|date=October 2009}} <!-- see WP:Filmplot -->
The film is presented so as to look as if it were a video file recovered from a digital [[camcorder]] by the [[United States Department of Defense]]. The film begins with a disclaimer stating that the following footage about to be viewed is of a case designated "'''Cloverfield'''" and was found in the area that was "formerly known as [[Central Park]]".
shakele is gay...................The film is presented so as to look as if it were a video file recovered from a digital [[camcorder]] by the [[United States Department of Defense]]. The film begins with a disclaimer stating that the following footage about to be viewed is of a case designated "'''Cloverfield'''" and was found in the area that was "formerly known as [[Central Park]]".


Robert "Rob" Hawkins wakes up in the morning on April 27 after sleeping with a previously [[platonic love|platonic]] best friend, Elizabeth "Beth" McIntyre. They plan to leave for [[Coney Island]] that day. The footage overlaps, cutting to the next month, when Rob's brother Jason and his girlfriend Lily prepare a farewell party for Rob as he is about to leave for his job in [[Japan]]. While the party goes on, Jason gives their friend Hudson "Hud" Platt the task of filming last testimonials for Rob, but while filming the party and his unsuccessful flirting with his crush Marlena Diamond, Hud also accidentally tapes over Rob and Beth's Coney Island trip. It also becomes apparent that Rob and Beth's relationship is at a low point due the fact that Rob didn't ever call or talk to Beth in the weeks since sleeping together and their Coney Island trip. This is significant because Rob was to leave for Japan on his business trip soon. Beth also brings another date to the party. After an argument, Beth leaves the party and Rob sits on the fire escape while Jason and Hud vainly try to console him. Suddenly, what seems to be an earthquake strikes, and the city suffers a brief [[power outage]]. The local news reports that an [[oil tanker]] has capsized in the bay off [[Liberty Island]]. Party guests go to the roof to spot the disaster and witness a huge explosion in [[Lower Manhattan]] which sends burning debris into the air, some of which lands on their building's roof. The party-goers run down the stairwell and into the street, which is filled with panicked residents, where the head of the [[Statue of Liberty]] suddenly appears, crashing down on the street before stopping near their building. Hud records what appears to be a giant monster between the buildings several blocks away before everyone (except Marlena) is forced to take shelter in a convenience store when the [[Woolworth Building]] collapses to the ground.
Robert "Rob" Hawkins wakes up in the morning on April 27 after sleeping with a previously [[platonic love|platonic]] best friend, Elizabeth "Beth" McIntyre. They plan to leave for [[Coney Island]] that day. The footage overlaps, cutting to the next month, when Rob's brother Jason and his girlfriend Lily prepare a farewell party for Rob as he is about to leave for his job in [[Japan]]. While the party goes on, Jason gives their friend Hudson "Hud" Platt the task of filming last testimonials for Rob, but while filming the party and his unsuccessful flirting with his crush Marlena Diamond, Hud also accidentally tapes over Rob and Beth's Coney Island trip. It also becomes apparent that Rob and Beth's relationship is at a low point due the fact that Rob didn't ever call or talk to Beth in the weeks since sleeping together and their Coney Island trip. This is significant because Rob was to leave for Japan on his business trip soon. Beth also brings another date to the party. After an argument, Beth leaves the party and Rob sits on the fire escape while Jason and Hud vainly try to console him. Suddenly, what seems to be an earthquake strikes, and the city suffers a brief [[power outage]]. The local news reports that an [[oil tanker]] has capsized in the bay off [[Liberty Island]]. Party guests go to the roof to spot the disaster and witness a huge explosion in [[Lower Manhattan]] which sends burning debris into the air, some of which lands on their building's roof. The party-goers run down the stairwell and into the street, which is filled with panicked residents, where the head of the [[Statue of Liberty]] suddenly appears, crashing down on the street before stopping near their building. Hud records what appears to be a giant monster between the buildings several blocks away before everyone (except Marlena) is forced to take shelter in a convenience store when the [[Woolworth Building]] collapses to the ground.

Revision as of 11:43, 21 October 2009

Cloverfield
Theatrical release poster
Directed byMatt Reeves
Written byDrew Goddard
Produced byJ. J. Abrams
Bryan Burk
StarringMichael Stahl-David
T. J. Miller
Jessica Lucas
Odette Yustman
Lizzy Caplan
Mike Vogel
CinematographyMichael Bonvillain
Edited byKevin Stitt
Music byMichael Giacchino
Production
company
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
January 18, 2008
Running time
84 minutes[1]
CountryTemplate:FilmUS
LanguageEnglish
Budget$25 million[2]
Box office$198,602,318[3]

Cloverfield is a Template:Fy American monster movie directed by Matt Reeves, produced by J. J. Abrams and written by Drew Goddard.

Before the film's release Paramount Pictures carried out a viral marketing campaign to promote the film. The campaign included viral tie-ins similar to Lost Experience.[4] The film follows five young New Yorkers attending a going-away party on the night that a gigantic monster attacks the city. First publicized within a teaser trailer in screenings of Transformers, the film was released on January 17 in New Zealand and Australia, on January 18 in North America, on January 24 in South Korea, on January 25 in Taiwan, on January 31 in Germany and on February 1 in Ireland, in the UK and in Italy. In Japan, the film was released on April 5. This film has been nominated for a UL Media Award for "Best Dramatic Film."

VFX and CGI were performed by effects studios Double Negative and Tippett Studio.

Plot

shakele is gay...................The film is presented so as to look as if it were a video file recovered from a digital camcorder by the United States Department of Defense. The film begins with a disclaimer stating that the following footage about to be viewed is of a case designated "Cloverfield" and was found in the area that was "formerly known as Central Park".

Robert "Rob" Hawkins wakes up in the morning on April 27 after sleeping with a previously platonic best friend, Elizabeth "Beth" McIntyre. They plan to leave for Coney Island that day. The footage overlaps, cutting to the next month, when Rob's brother Jason and his girlfriend Lily prepare a farewell party for Rob as he is about to leave for his job in Japan. While the party goes on, Jason gives their friend Hudson "Hud" Platt the task of filming last testimonials for Rob, but while filming the party and his unsuccessful flirting with his crush Marlena Diamond, Hud also accidentally tapes over Rob and Beth's Coney Island trip. It also becomes apparent that Rob and Beth's relationship is at a low point due the fact that Rob didn't ever call or talk to Beth in the weeks since sleeping together and their Coney Island trip. This is significant because Rob was to leave for Japan on his business trip soon. Beth also brings another date to the party. After an argument, Beth leaves the party and Rob sits on the fire escape while Jason and Hud vainly try to console him. Suddenly, what seems to be an earthquake strikes, and the city suffers a brief power outage. The local news reports that an oil tanker has capsized in the bay off Liberty Island. Party guests go to the roof to spot the disaster and witness a huge explosion in Lower Manhattan which sends burning debris into the air, some of which lands on their building's roof. The party-goers run down the stairwell and into the street, which is filled with panicked residents, where the head of the Statue of Liberty suddenly appears, crashing down on the street before stopping near their building. Hud records what appears to be a giant monster between the buildings several blocks away before everyone (except Marlena) is forced to take shelter in a convenience store when the Woolworth Building collapses to the ground.

When they get out, Jason tells everyone that they have to leave Manhattan, choosing the Brooklyn Bridge as an escape route. As they cross the span, Rob gets a call on his cellphone from Beth and stops moving. Hud, Lily and Marlena stop as well, but Jason cannot hear them and keeps going. Suddenly, the monster's tail smashes the main span of the bridge, causing it to collapse and send Jason and hundreds of others in the water. The survivors are forced to flee back to Manhattan.

Marlena and Hud try to comfort Rob and Lily over the loss of Jason. Rob attempts to use his phone again, but discovers the battery has gone dead. He stops at an electronics store that is being looted and steals a cell phone battery to listen to Beth's message; she is trapped and unable to move. On the news, Hud sees that the National Guard has begun a city-wide evacuation and is counter-attacking the creature. The news also reports that people are being attacked by parasitic spider-like creatures (named PSD's in the Blu-Ray special investigation mode) that are falling off the monster. After an argument, Rob, Hud, Lily and Marlena take to the Manhattan streets to rescue Beth.

They are soon caught in an intense crossfire between the monster and the military. The group is barely able to escape into the subway. They decide to go through the subway tunnels of the IRT Lexington Avenue Line to reach Beth's apartment, but are attacked by several of the parasites. One of them bites Marlena as she tries to rescue Hud. The group escapes into the abandoned Bloomingdale's department store via the 59th Street subway station, and are met by Sergeant Pryce and a squad of United States Army soldiers, who have taken cover inside the store and set up a field hospital to treat the wounded and also established a command center. As Rob explains to the field commander of them on their way to rescue Beth, Marlena begins to bleed from her eyes and nose. When she is revealed to have been bitten, two men in hazmat suits grab her and take her behind a curtain while Lily, Rob and Hud are taken away by soldiers. Hud films the curtains and sees Marlena's stomach expands and throws everything out upward. Rob and the others have little time to grieve as Sergeant Pryce, who appears sympathetic to their cause, allows them back up to the streets, but warns them to report to a military evacuation site before 6:00 am, which is when the last helicopter evacuates Manhattan and the United States Military will enact its "Hammerdown" protocol, which will permit the total destruction of Manhattan if necessary to kill the monster.

The group finds Beth's apartment tower at Time Warner Center has collapsed against the center's other tower. They climb the standing tower and cross onto the roof of Beth's building and work their way down to her apartment. Beth is found trapped and impaled by a concrete rebar, but they are able to free her. After the rescue, the four make their way to an aerial evacuation site where they encounter the monster once more over Grand Central Station while the military continues to engage it. At the landing zone, Lily is raced into a departing helicopter without her friends. Moments later, Rob, Beth and Hud are taken away in a second helicopter and witness a U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit carpet-bomb the monster. Just as Hud begins hailing victory over the monster, it suddenly reaches up and attacks the helicopter, causing it to crash into a grassy clearing in Central Park. A voice on the helicopter's radio warns of the Hammerdown protocol being effective in fifteen minutes as well as stating that anyone who hears the sirens is in the blast zone.

Hud and Beth pull an injured Rob clear of the helicopter wreckage, but Hud returns to recover the camera and as he does, the monster appears above him. This is the first time the monster is seen clearly and in daylight. It curiously examines Hud for a moment, then attempts to eat him, spitting out his corpse. Rob and Beth grab the still-recording camera and take shelter under a bridge in Central Park as air raid sirens begin to blare and high-altitude bombers can be heard in the distance, indicating that the Hammerdown protocol is about to begin. Rob and Beth quickly take turns leaving their last testimonies of the day, which Rob mentions as Saturday, May 23, on camera. Numerous explosions occur outside and the monster is heard screaming in pain. As the bridge collapses and debris covers the camera, Rob and Beth can be heard professing their love to one another before another explosion occurs. The film cuts to Rob and Beth's Coney Island date. In the distance, an object can be seen falling from the sky into the ocean.

After the credits a brief radio call is heard, saying "Help us". If played backwards, the audio states "It's still alive." [citation needed]

Cast

Further information: List of characters in the Cloverfield universe

To prevent the leaking of plot information, instead of auditioning the actors with scenes from the film, scripts from Abrams' previous productions were used, such as television series Alias and Lost. 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".[5]

Production

Development

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

J. J. Abrams thought up a new monster after he and his son visited a toy store in Japan while promoting Mission: Impossible III. He explained, "We saw all these Godzilla toys, and I thought, we need our own [American] monster, and not like King Kong. I love King Kong. King Kong is adorable. And Godzilla is a charming monster. We love Godzilla. But I wanted something that was just insane, and intense."[6][7] Abrams pays homage to King Kong approximately 67 minutes into the movie, just after the helicopter crashes. When the video of the camera breaks up, a quick scene from Coney Island is seen. This is followed by several still frames from the original King Kong movie. There are two other still frames in "pre-recorded" sequences, one from the movie Them! and one from The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms - these two movies are also cited in the credits.

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.[8] The visual effects producer was Chantal Feghali.

The severed 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. 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'."[9]

Title

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.[10] And people always found out what we were doing!" The director said that "Cloverfield" was the government's case designation for the events caused by 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.[11] The film's final title, Cloverfield, is the name of the exit Abrams takes to his Santa Monica office.[10][12]

One final title, Greyshot, was proposed before the movie was officially titled Cloverfield. The name Greyshot is taken from the archway that the two survivors take shelter under at the end of the movie. Director Matt Reeves said that it was decided not to change the title to Greyshot because the film was already so well known as Cloverfield.[13]

The other tentative film titles were:

  • 1-18-08 (USA) (promotional title)
  • Cheese (USA) (fake working title)
  • Clover (USA) (fake working title)
  • Monstrous (USA) (promotional title)
  • Slusho (USA) (fake working title)
  • Untitled J.J. Abrams Project (USA) (working title)
  • Greyshot (USA) (proposed title)

Filming

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 2007 in New York.[8] One cast member indicated that the film would look like it cost $150 million, despite producers not casting recognizable and expensive actors.[5] Filmmakers used the Panasonic HVX200 for most of the interior scenes, and the Sony CineAlta F23 high-definition video camera to film nearly all of the New York exterior scenes.[14] Filming took place on Coney Island, with scenes shot at Deno's Wonder Wheel Amusement Park and the B&B Carousel.[15] Some interior shots were filmed on a soundstage at Downey, California, Bloomingdale's in the movie was actually filmed in an emptied Robinsons-May store that was under reconstruction in Arcadia, California, and the outside scenes of Sephora and the electronics store were filmed in Downtown Los Angeles.[16]

Brooklyn Bridge, as viewed through the film's first-person narrative

The film was shot and edited in a cinéma vérité style,[17] to look like it was filmed with one hand-held camera, including jump cuts similar to ones found in home movies. T. J. Miller, who plays Hud, has said in various interviews that he filmed a third of the movie and almost half of it made it into the film.[18] 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. According to him: "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."[19]

Several of the filmmakers are heard but not seen in the film. The man yelling "Oh my God!" repeatedly when the head of the Statue of Liberty lands in the street is producer Bryan Burk, and director Matt Reeves voiced the whispered radio broadcast at the end of the credits.[13]

After viewing a cut of the film, Steven Spielberg suggested giving the audience a hint at the fate of the monster during the climax, which resulted in the addition of a countdown overheard on the helicopter's radio and the sounding of air raid sirens to signal the forthcoming Hammerdown bombing.[13]

Creature design

Main article: Clover (creature)

Visual main effects supervisor Phil Tippett and his company Tippett Studio were enlisted to develop the visual effects for Cloverfield.[20] Because 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.[21] Artist Neville Page designed the monster, thoroughly creating a biological rationale for the creature, even if many of his ideas like "elongated, and articulated external esophagus" would not show up on screen.[22] The key idea behind the monster was that he was an immature creature suffering from "separation anxiety". This recalls real-life elephants who get frightened and lash out at the circus, because the director felt "there's nothing scarier than something huge that's spooked".[23]

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.[19] 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.[8] A second trailer was released on November 16, 2007 which was attached to Beowulf, confirming the title.[24]

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. saw 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".[25]

Pre-release 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 (based on a mis-interpretation of the trailer's line "It's alive!" as "It's a lion!"), a new film about Godzilla, or a spin-off of the TV show Lost.[26] The Star Ledger also reported the possibility of the film being based on Lovecraft lore or Godzilla.[27] The Guardian reported the possibility of a Lost spin-off,[28] while Time Out reported that the film was about an alien called "The Parasite".[29] IGN also backed the possibility of that premise, with The Parasite rumored to be a working title for the film.[30] Online, Slusho and Colossus had been discussed as other possible titles.[31] Entertainment Weekly also disputed reports that the film would be about a parasite or a colossal Asian robot such as Voltron.[32]

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 games Halo 2 and Halo 3, the Nine Inch Nails album Year Zero, and the newest 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,[33] and the Comic-Con teaser poster for the film.[25] A popular piece of fan art posited that the monster was a mutated Humpback Whale.[23]

Viral tie-ins

File:Cloverfield shots.JPG
Photos on the 1-18-08.com viral marketing website

Puzzle websites containing Lovecraftian elements, such as Ethan Haas Was Right, were originally reported to be connected to the film.[26][28] 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.[34] At the site, a collection of time-coded photos are provided to visitors to piece together a series of events and interpret their meanings. The pictures can also be flipped over – by repeatedly and rapidly moving the mouse side to side. Also, while on 1-18-08.com, if the page is left open long enough, the monster's roar can be heard. Eventually, www.cloverfieldmovie.com was created. The site provided both a trailer and a number, 33287, which, when texted to from a mobile phone, provided a ringtone of the monster's roar and a wallpaper of a decimated Manhattan. This eventually turns out to be a Paramount number (people later received material on Iron Man, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Kung Fu Panda and The Love Guru).[35]

As part of the viral marketing campaign, the drink Slusho! has served as a tie-in. The drink had already appeared in producer Abrams' previous creation, the TV series Alias.[36] Viral websites for Slusho! and a Japanese drilling company named Tagruato (タグルアト, Taguruato) were launched to add to the mythology of Cloverfield. A building bearing the company logo for Tagruato can also be seen in the TV spot of the eleventh Star Trek film, another Abrams production.[4] When Cloverfield was hosted at Comic-Con 2007, gray Slusho! T-shirts were distributed to attendees.[37] Fans who had registered at the Slusho! website for Cloverfield received e-mails of fictional sonar images before the film's release that showed a deep-sea creature heading toward Manhattan.[38]

On the Tagruato website, the only page besides the homepage that has the "warped sword" symbol is the deep sea drilling, and "Clover" supposedly originated from the ocean surrounding Coney Island. If someone goes to the interactive map feature, the closest station is the "Chuai Station" that was set to open 4 months after the attack on New York. The mysterious company almost surely has a link to Cloverfield and its origin. Possibly they awakened the creature when constructing the station. It also states in the "Headlines" section that there has been an altercation and it will be fixed shortly, as they have sent out special teams to deal with the problem. It also states that Tagruato's satellite is tracking a fallen piece of a satellite made by the Japanese Government with no luck so far, but says "According to Hatsui data, it disappeared into the Atlantic Ocean late last week" (Hatsui being the name of the satellite).

In addition to Tagruato.jp, Slusho.jp, Jamieandteddy.com and 1-18-08.com have at least one "warped sword" symbol in each. Slusho features it on its homepage, 1-18-08.com features it behind Teddy Hansen's photograph and Jamieandteddy.com features it on its homepage, making it seem as if there's a relationship between the three of them.

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."[4] 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."[36]

Merchandise

A four-installment prequel manga series by Yoshiki Togawa titled Cloverfield/Kishin (クローバーフィールド/KISHIN, Kurōbāfīrudo/KISHIN) is being released by Japanese publisher Kadokawa Shoten.[39] The story focuses on a Japanese high school student named Kishin Aiba, who somehow bears a connection to the monster.[40]

Based on the successful opening weekend of Cloverfield in theaters, Hasbro began accepting orders for a 14-inch (36 cm) collectible toy figure of the monster with authentic sound[41] and its parasites to be shipped to fans by December 24, 2008.[42]

Music and sound

Untitled

Due to its presentation as footage from a consumer digital recorder, Cloverfield has no film score, with the exception of the composition "Roar! (Cloverfield Overture)" by Michael Giacchino that plays over the end credits. Similarities between "Roar!" and the music of Godzilla composer Akira Ifukube have been noted, and it has been suggested that Giacchino's overture is a tribute to Ifukube's work,[43][44] which was confirmed by Matt Reeves in the DVD's commentary track.[13] The sound track was supervised by William Files[45] and Douglas Murray[46] at Skywalker Sound.

Rob's Party Mix or Cloverfield Mix is a collection of the music played in the opening party sequences of the film that was released exclusively on Apple's iTunes store on January 22, 2008 in lieu of a traditional soundtrack album. The Cloverfield score, "Roar! (Cloverfield Overture)" by Michael Giacchino that plays over the end credits[47] is not featured on the album, as it is the mixtape played at the party and is not the official soundtrack of the film. This album was distributed to guests at a Cloverfield premiere party held at the Dark Room in New York City on January 17, 2008.[48]

A complete soundtrack release of all the music in the film, including Giacchino's "Roar!" end title piece, has now also been released exclusively on iTunes; it has not been officially released in retail stores. A CD entitled Rob's Party Mix comes packaged in a special edition of Cloverfield made available for sale in Canadian Wal-Mart stores beginning on April 22, 2008.

Although Ashley Tisdale's "He Said, She Said" was in the movie, it was cut from the soundtrack.

Track listing
No.TitleArtistLength
1."West Coast"Coconut Records3:32
2."Taper Jean Girl"Kings of Leon3:05
3."Beautiful Girls"Sean Kingston4:01
4."Do I Have Your Attention"The Blood Arm3:35
5."Got Your Moments"Scissors for Lefty3:11
6."Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)"Parliament5:46
7."19-2000"Gorillaz3:27
8."The Underdog"Spoon3:42
9."Pistol of Fire"Kings of Leon2:20
10."Disco Lies"Moby3:22
11."Do the Whirlwind"Architecture in Helsinki4:39
12."Grown So Ugly"The Black Keys2:24
13."Four Winds"Bright Eyes4:16
14."The Ride"Joan As Policewoman3:09
15."Seventeen Years"Ratatat4:26
16."Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games"Of Montreal4:15
17."Fuzz" (ファズ)Mucc4:47

Reception

Cloverfield opened in 3,411 theaters on January 18, 2008 and grossed a total of $16,930,000 on its opening day in the United States and Canada. It made $40,058,229 on its opening weekend, making it the most successful January release to date. Worldwide, it has grossed $170,602,318, making it the first movie in 2008 to gross over $100 million.[49] Critics mostly praised Cloverfield. As of April 27, 2008, review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 77% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 173 reviews.[50] According to Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received an average score of 64, based on 37 reviews.[51]

Marc Savlov of The Austin Chronicle calls the film "the most intense and original creature feature I've seen in my adult moviegoing life [...] a pure-blood, grade A, exultantly exhilarating monster movie." He cites Matt Reeves' direction, the "whip-smart, stylistically invisible" script and the "nearly subconscious evocation of our current paranoid, terror-phobic times" as the keys to the film's success, saying that telling the story through the lens of one character's camera "works fantastically well".[52] 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".[53] Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly said that the film was "surreptitiously subversive, [a] stylistically clever little gem", and that while the characters were "vapid, twenty-something nincompoops" and the acting "appropriately unmemorable", the decision to tell the story through amateur footage was "brilliant".[54] Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that the film is "pretty scary at times" and cites "unmistakable evocations of 9/11". He concludes that "all in all, it is an effective film, deploying its special effects well and never breaking the illusion that it is all happening as we see it".[55]

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".[56] Scott Foundas of LA Weekly was critical of the film's use of scenes reminiscent of the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York City and called it "cheap and opportunistic". He suggested that the film was engaging in "stealth" attempts at social commentary and compared this unfavorably to the films of Don Siegel, George A. Romero and Steven Spielberg, saying, "Where those filmmakers all had something meaningful to say about the state of the world and [...] human nature, Abrams doesn't have much to say about anything".[57] Manohla Dargis in the New York Times called the allusions "tacky", saying, "[The images] may make you think of the attack, and you may curse the filmmakers for their vulgarity, insensitivity or lack of imagination", but that "the film is too dumb to offend anything except your intelligence". She concludes that the film "works as a showcase for impressively realistic-looking special effects, a realism that fails to extend to the scurrying humans whose fates are meant to invoke pity and fear but instead inspire yawns and contempt."[17] Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com calls the film "badly constructed, humorless and emotionally sadistic", and sums up by saying that the film "takes the trauma of 9/11 and turns it into just another random spectacle at which to point and shoot".[58] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune warned that the viewer may feel "queasy" at the references to September 11, but that "other sequences [...] carry a real jolt" and that such tactics were "crude, but undeniably gripping". He called the film "dumb", but "quick and dirty and effectively brusque", concluding that despite it being "a harsher, more demographically calculating brand of fun", he enjoyed the film.[47] Bruce Paterson of Cinephilia described the film as "a successful experiment in style but not necessarily a successful story for those who want dramatic closure".

Cloverfield appeared on some critics' top ten lists of the best films of 2008. Empire magazine named it the fifth best film of 2008[59], and Tasha Robinson of The A.V. Club named it the sixth best film of 2008.[59] In addition, the prestigious French film journal Cahiers du Cinema named the film as the third best of 2008.

The movie was nominated for four awards: It was nominated for two Saturn Awards for "Best supporting actress (Lizzy Caplan)" and "Best science fiction film". It was nominated for two Golden Trailer Awards for "Best Thriller for Trailer" and "Most original trailer".[citation needed] The film went on to win a Saturn Award for "Best science fiction film". It was also ranked #12 on Bravo's 13 Scarier Movie Moments.[citation needed]

Shaky camerawork

Sign at an AMC theater warning customers by likening the film to a roller coaster.

The film's shaky camera style of cinematography, dubbed "Queasy-Cam" by Roger Ebert, has caused some viewers (particularly in darkened movie theaters) to experience vertigo, including nausea and a temporary loss of balance. Audience members prone to migraines have cited the film as a trigger. Some theaters showing the film, such as AMC Theatres, posted warnings, informing viewers about the filming style of Cloverfield while other theatres like Pacific Theatres verbally warned guests at the box office about experiencing motion sickness upon viewing the film and what to do if they had to step out.[60]

The cinematography influences the encoding of the video and can cause compression artifacts to fast motion across the field of view.[61]

Home media release

The DVD was released on April 22, 2008 in two versions: the standard single-disc edition and an exclusive "steel-book" special edition that was sold at Suncoast and FYE retailers in the US and Future Shop in Canada. Other store exclusives include an exclusive bonus disc titled "T.J. Miller's Video Diary" with the DVD at all Best Buy retailers, an exclusive mix CD titled "Rob's Goin' to Japan Party Mix" with the DVD at all Target and Wal-Mart retailers and an exclusive ringtone with the DVD at all Kmart and Sears retailers. Borders also has an exclusive booklet encased with their DVD.

The Region 2 DVD was released on June 9 in both one-disc and two-disc editions. The limited steelbook edition is only available from HMV, while Play.com offers exclusive cover artwork. The HMV-exclusive steelbook contains two discs.

The DVD includes two alternative endings, which vary only slightly. The first alternative ending shows Rob and Beth exiting the Coney Island–Stillwell Avenue station instead of on the Ferris wheel and features different sirens in the background as Rob talks to the camera. In the second alternative ending, just after the final explosion, Beth can be heard screaming "Rob!", followed by a very brief clip of an unknown person looking at the camera (in the commentary, Matt Reeves said that it was one of the crew members) and brushing rubble off the lens. The film then ends with the original final clip of Rob and Beth on their Coney Island date recording themselves on the ferris wheel as the camera tape runs out, with two differences: there is no timestamp in the lower left-hand corner of the screen, and there is an additional beeping tone indicating the end of the tape.[62]

A Blu-ray edition was released on June 3, 2008.[63] It includes a "Special Investigation Mode," as well as all the bonus features of the 2-disc DVD in HD.

Sequel

At the premiere of the film, Matt Reeves talked about possibilities on how a sequel will turn out if the film succeeds.[64] According to Reeves, "While we were on set making the film we talked about the possibilities and directions of how a sequel can go. The fun of this movie was that it might not have been the only movie being made that night, there might be another movie! In today's day and age of people filming their lives on their camera phones and Handycams, uploading it to YouTube... That was kind of exciting thinking about that."[65]

In another interview, Reeves states:

There's a moment on the Brooklyn Bridge, and there was a guy filming something on the side of the bridge, and Hud sees him filming and he turns over and he sees the ship that's been capsized and sees the headless Statue of Liberty, and then he turns back and this guy's briefly filming him. In my mind that was two movies intersecting for a brief moment, and I thought there was something interesting in the idea that this incident happened and there are so many different points of view, and there are several different movies at least happening that evening and we just saw one piece of another.[23]

Reeves also points out that the end scene on Coney Island shows something falling into the ocean in the background (pointed out by fans to be in the far right from the view out of the ferris wheel, a bit left of a boat sitting in the water seen falling just as the camera beeps), but didn't give out details.[23] (This is, however, many days before the start of the film and shows the two main characters on Coney island before they meet again at the start of the party — as shown by the date stamp on the footage from the camera. This relates to how events began to happen and the satellite which falls from orbit owned by the Japanese media company mentioned).

Producers Bryan Burk and J. J. Abrams also announced their thoughts to Entertainment Weekly about possible sequel(s). According to Bryan Burk, "The creative team has fleshed out an entire backstory which, if we're lucky, we might get to explore in future films".[66]

Also, Abrams states that he does not want to rush into the development of the sequel right away because of the first film's success, instead he wants to create a sequel that is true to the previous film.[66]

At the end of January, Matt Reeves entered early talks with Paramount Pictures to direct a sequel to Cloverfield, which would likely be filmed before Reeves's other project, The Invisible Woman.[67] Reeves now said:

The idea of doing something so differently is exhilarating. We hope that it created a movie experience that is different. The thing about doing a sequel is that I think we all really feel protective of that experience. The key here will be if we can find something that is compelling enough and that is different enough for us to do, then it will probably be worth doing. Obviously it also depends on how Cloverfield does worldwide and all of those things too, but really, for us creatively, we just want to find something that would be another challenge.[68]

In an interview with IGN [when?], J. J. Abrams stated that they are still in talks with Paramount. Abrams thought that it would be fun to work on something different. Matt Reeves and Drew Goddard have drawn up different stories for the sequel, but Abrams is only considering the idea of continuing Cloverfield. Paramount is still trying to seal the deal for the sequel.

In an interview with "Attack of the Show", J. J. Abrams had stated that a sequel had not been finalized yet [when?], though Matt Reeves and Paramount are still in talks. In a separate interview, Matt Reeves had stated the same thing. In the same interview between Abrams and "AOTS", Abrams had said that they might abandon the filming style, stating that he and the rest of the crew would like to try something new.

When asked by CraveOnline what the current status is on Cloverfield 2[69], Abrams stated that at this point, they are still discussing it; however, he still feels reluctant to work on a sequel. In the same interview, Abrams said that they were working on something that "could be kind of cool." When asked if it would take place in a different location, Abrams replied by saying that "It would be a totally different kind of thing but it's too early to talk about."

Translations

The film title was translated in different ways to other languages, some of which are:

Cultural references

References

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Wikiquote has quotations related to Cloverfield.
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Film
2007 		Succeeded by
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