Directed by:
Dan TrachtenbergCinematography:
Jeff CutterComposer:
Bear McCrearyCast:
John Goodman, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, John Gallagher Jr., Douglas M. Griffin, Suzanne Cryer, Bradley Cooper, Frank Mottek, Sumalee MontanoVOD (4)
Plots(1)
Following a car accident, Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) awakens in the basement fallout shelter of a conspiracy-crazed man (John Goodman) who claims to have saved her from the wreckage of the crash. He also informs her that a chemical attack has devastated the surrounding area, rendering the outside world uninhabitable. Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.), who barely made it into the shelter, corroborates this version of events, but Michelle remains suspicious. As the dynamics within the bunker continually shift, she begins to doubt the truth of both what's happening in the shelter and in the outside world. (Paramount Pictures)
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Reviews (17)
The strongest aspects of the film are the story, the suspense and the feeling of uncertainty, where you have no idea whether John Goodman is a kidnapper or not and whether there is indeed a contaminated uninhabitable land outside or not until the final scene. This factor builds up the atmosphere and suspense and there are some good ideas, all underlined by solid performances. I had fun. 75%.
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The sophisticated story structure that releases just enough information to keep the viewer entertained is textbook level. Thanks to the fact that Johnny Be Good(man) can be equally terrifying as he is a nice guy, and that there’s always something to look at (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Lots of powerful moments and cruel twists. Overall, it seems like a costly beginning to a series that we’ll probably never see. The finale works, even if you have an inkling of what is in store, but sweet ignorance is again more preferable.
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With the Cloverfield brand comes a damn heavy burden. The original Cloverfield was able to combine the drama of the main characters with something big and terrifying that was located vaguely far away and at the same time all around. The identically named street has, as always, the believable Mary, in the form of the roaring John Goodman, as well as the question mark about what is hiding outside this time. However, with the main asset also comes the main obstacle, because we all suspect that something unexpected must happen in the final act, which doesn't fit too well with the previous course of events. The formula was only partially repeated, mainly thanks to the actors and a healthy dose of tension arising from the most ordinary situations. And yet the whole thing looks like two films stitched together.
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A very current elaboration of a classic disaster theme, which in many respects continues freely in the footsteps of Spielberg's War of the Worlds. Goodman's character is not overshot in any way, and comes off to me exactly like an obese man in survival documentaries - a perverse mixture of rationality, vigilance and paranoia, with a hint something devious. It was a good decision to use highly subjective detail, low depth of field and sharpened sound. Sometimes it suffocates and cramps very pleasantly, sometimes it planes a thick string too ostentatiously and bets on "approximately motivated" twists as well as instructively reaped motifs. But as a whole, it doesn't embarrass the Cloverfield concept; on the contrary, despite all the modeling, the result is a thrilling and quite stimulating affair about the monster inside and out. And a celebration of human ingenuity. Take Shelter meets McGyver meets Im Keller. Good job. [75%]
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It would certainly be stimulating to discuss the (viral) marketing of 10 Cloverfield Lane, the 1980s pop-culture references and design (John Hughes), Michelle’s position among other self-sufficient female characters of recent times, the reflection on society’s rising demand for an authoritative leader, or the subversion of the star system by casting John Goodman in a slightly different “dad” role, but for me, this is primarily a textbook thriller that makes maximum use of the information provided within its confined world. Practically every element to which our attention is directed by a longer, close-up or point-of-view shot can be described as compositionally motivated, even though it may at first seem that its purpose is only to amuse us (the infantile shower curtain with a duck motif). Furthermore, in the case of objects that return to the action at greater temporal distance, we are first verbally notified before their involvement in the plot that they have not been forgotten, so that their subsequent use does not feel like a deus ex machina (the bottle of alcohol that Michelle takes from the table when leaving the apartment at the beginning, later mentioned by Howard, and whose star moment comes just before the end). At the same time, the significance of the props is not constant and, for example, the girls’ magazines first notify us that Howard has apparently lost his daughter and are later transformed into part of a staged performance (to reinforce the illusion that Michelle is like Howard’s daughter) and finally into a source of important information that is needed for survival. Every piece of the puzzle is justified sooner or later and it is thus appropriate that even putting the puzzle together turns from being a pastime for the characters into a disturbing clue for the viewer when Emmett ambiguously points out that a few pieces are still missing. And indeed – at the given moment we don’t yet know the whole truth, as will soon become apparent, which makes for a brief, undramatic interlude during which the source of the threat is seemingly lurking just outside. The word-guessing game has a similarly unsettling subtext, using the limiting of the narrative point of view to Michelle – we thus do not know what Howard really knows and, like his two “adopted offspring”, we can’t determine if he’s still playing or maliciously telling them the truth. The seemingly time-killing scene in which Emmett and Michelle talk about their missed chances in life is then absolutely crucial to the film’s meaning, and 10 Cloverfield Lane owes it a lot for the emotionally very powerful and yet – like the whole concept on which the plot is based (three people in a bunker, at least one of whom has a dark secret) – refreshingly simple ending that makes one quickly forget about the unnecessarily spectacular (and, given the tidy confinement of the world in which we had previously found ourselves, disturbing) climax. 85%
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