Cloverfield (Rifftrax)

Film Year:  2008
Genre:  Science Fiction, Horror
Director:  Matt Reeves
Starring:  T.J. Miller, Michael Stahl-David, Oddett (Annable) Yustman, Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, Mike Vogel, or, as the movie refers to them all repeatedly, just "Dude"
Rifftrax Year:  2008
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

The Movie

I think we all have one of those movies that we just don't like, and when you say "Honestly I didn't like it" there's always a group of people who scoff at you and refer to you as a mental midget who "Doesn't get it."  I have a few of those, but while Cloverfield might not top that list it's very much in the top ten somewhere.

Very much a post-9/11 movie, Cloverfield takes the tried-and-true idea of a giant monster attacking a city and tries to tell it from a civilian perspective.  These are people who don't know what's going on, they are not in any sort of political position to listen to "theories" or "origins" or the like, and are just trying to survive.  It's a story about those people who you see running away in those quick shots in a Godzilla movie.  This is a really good idea for a movie.  So much so that it deserves a movie that sucks far less than Cloverfield does.

This movie has so many issues that deflate it's concept.  For a film that's trying to be innovative with it's perspective, it's plotline is surprisingly trite.  The film becomes a story of two would-be-lovers separated across the city trying to reunite, trying to dodge a giant monster along the way.  This wouldn't be entirely bothersome if they felt three-dimensional in the slightest.  Instead they are projecting worn out tropes that shows on the CW have driven into the ground, and when your leads are lacking in being interesting in the slightest then presenting your film as a character drama becomes a problem (poor characterization in a character driven narrative is actually a common problem I have with Matt Reeves' directorial work in general).

Extending beyond that, the supporting characters who follow them around are obnoxious and not that bright.  The cameraman we're stuck with throughout most of the movie, Hud (played by a young T.J. Miller), never shuts up, belly flops some weak comic relief, and does some of the stupidest things I've ever seen in a movie.  Granted, a film in "found footage" style needs to keep the camera rolling, but there also needs to be a reasonable excuse.  [REC] had a reasonable excuse, as did Paranormal Activity.  While it was stretching credibility at times, The Blair Witch Project seemed to also have more of a motivation behind it.  Cloverfield's excuse for keeping the camera rolling is that Hud's an idiot.

While on the subject of camerawork, the film often defeats the purpose of its format by framing itself way too well.  The camera often laboriously drops in the exact spot it needs to to get everything on film and look stylized doing so.  The found footage subgenre does not benefit from auteur cinematography.  At most times I can't take the realism the film is trying to portray seriously because it's portraying it is such a plastic, shiny, and phony manner.

Cloverfield is about as simple as a movie comes, but it really needed to scale itself back and be simpler.  Cinematography needed to be rougher, weak character development needed to not be breezed through in chatterbox opening dialogue, and it overall needs to feel more genuine.  I might have responded to this film far more had it just simply been the story of a group of friends trying to escape the city but unfortunately become thwarted at every turn by the monster, and without need for a hackneyed love story pretending to be the heart of the screenplay.  When Cloverfield embraces the idea of just portraying confused citizens, it can be quite strong, but then it just does something stupid in trying to shoot for more and my attention drifts.

Cloverfield isn't the worst movie ever made, but it's far more mediocre than most give it credit for.  As a monster movie fan I want to like this movie (though I take one look at that hilariously bad monster design and just shudder).  I like parts of it, and other portions piss me off.  The film did eventually spawn a franchise, which oddly enough are two anthology sequels almost a decade later that initially had nothing to do with the film but were reworked in post-production to have connections to it.  The first, 10 Cloverfield Lane, is a solid thriller that deserved better than a half-assed retitle to tie-in to this movie.  The second, The Cloverfield Paradox, is just terrible, a film that is so bad I almost look back on the first with fondness in retrospect.  To an extent the release of that film was a godsend, because it proved to myself that I never really thought this first one was a bad movie, just a frustrating one that didn't know what the idea it had was.  And now it's a franchise that doesn't seem to have an idea at all.

The Trax

Probably the first thing one will notice is that this is one of the trickier syncs Rifftrax has ever attempted.  If one doesn't time the opening logo sync well then you're given fast, low, mumbled dialogue as sync points for a good long while.  Helpful tips to improve your sync experience:  1.  Watch this movie beforehand.  Following the film's dialogue is almost impossible when one is listening to the Rifftrax as well, so it helps to be a little familiar with it.  2.  Even after watching the film prior, I suggest subtitles for the first five minutes or so to help with the sync.

But once you're synced and ready to rock 'n' roll, Cloverfield is well worth your patience.  It's definitely one of the funniest of Rifftrax's entire library.  The film is a heavily flawed movie that has most of its flaws overlooked, whereas the riff rips them wide open...

"No matter what happens keeping the camera going takes precedence over our safety!"

The stupidity of the film comes under fire at every turn, and there is plenty of pleasant, gleeful mockery at it.  Of course, the use of a camcorder is the highlight, though there is plenty of jabs at the poor character drama and a lot of riding on the obnoxious character of Hud.  The annoying character tropes are played up, which is beautiful.  The great thing about what they're mocking with these characters is that everything they emphasize about them is actually perfectly established in the movie, whether the movie realizes it or not, and they're just underlining it.

But even when the film isn't being roasted Cloverfield manages to shine as a riff.  There are just some fun riffs inspired by the imagery that just give you belly laughs for days.  There is a great riff on the iconic scene of the head of the Statue of Liberty being dropped the sky, which Mike commentates on like a sports announcer watching baseball.  Little moments like this help the riff sing, because despite the movie's worst tendencies they're never angry at it.  They're having fun with it.  And so am I.  Congratulations Rifftrax, you've made Cloverfield fun.  And you've managed to sum up the entire film in one of my favorite riffs...

"Oh wow!  It seems so real because it's shot so poorly!"

Classic