CLOVERFIELD (2008)

I hope I'm not spoiling this for anybody when I say the entire film is presented in a "found footage" format. I didn't know it was going to be that way, but after my initial "Are you fucking kidding me?!" reaction I settled into the movie and found it to be rather entertaining. I'm not a fan of the whole "shaky-as-fuck" camerawork, so thankfully the filmmakers had the good sense to keep that garbage to a minimum.

The footage belongs to a group of yuppie douchers who are throwing a surprise party for a fellow doucher. Things go as expected with some partying and drinking and people going "Wooo!", but then enters the extremely hot chick that the main doucher is secretly in love with and that was a brilliant move because suddenly I forgot all about the fact that this is a monster movie and as I'm focusing all my attention on this nerd pining away over the hot chick when suddenly there's a violent boom. Party goers freak out and run up to the roof right in time to see a large explosion in the distant. Flaming debris starts raining down on them, so they retreat down to the streets and that's when all Hell breaks loose.

The main doucher and a few of his friends go off on foot trying to figure out a way to get out of town when suddenly he gets a message from the hot chick saying that she's injured and trapped in her apartment on the 39th floor of a building a few streets over...right exactly where all the action is going on. So now they have to fight their way against the traffic, a growing military presence and a gigantic monster to save this chick with the killer body. And trust me, this chick is hot enough that it's worth it. I'd fight a horde of zombie ratpires any day of the fucking week for this chick. I might even consider watching a Will Smith mov...nah, never mind, she's not that hot.

I liked the film, but I doubt that I'll ever watch it again. I really wish the main characters had been more likeable and their characters developed more at the beginning so that way when the violence broke out I would have actually given a fuck as to who lived or died. As it was, I just wanted everybody on screen to die as violently as possible. Also the pace. Think about ALIENS. It starts out slow, builds the characters then when the actions hits it's an nonstop assault of violence that barely even gives the audience a chance to catch their breath. More filmmakers should take lesson from early James Cameron films.

Anyway, entertaining film, minor blood, zero gore, zero nudity, good for a single viewing but after you see what all the mystery and hype is about I really can't see any reason to revisit it.

Same universe - 10 Cloverfield Land (2016)
Same universe - The Cloverfield Paradox (2018)

KING KONG.

THEM.

THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS.

Kinda looks like a ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK poster.

OUTBREAK (1995)

The tagline on the poster says "Try to remain calm." Well, with a film as shoddy, boring and rushed together looking as OUTBREAK that ain't gonna be too hard to do.

OUTBREAK starts out well enough with a mysterious sickness killing off people in Zaire. Military virologist Dustin Hoffman is sent in to investigate. He quickly realizes there's some serious shit going down, but when he requests that his superiors sound the alert they instead say it's nothing and reassign him. And that's where OUTBREAK falters. A taut, well-written story about a highly contagious virus spreading like wildfire could be awesome! Instead, around the midway point OUTBREAK becomes less about the virus and more about the military coverup. Hint: I don't care.

Whenever I watch a movie about an killer virus outbreak I want it to be about a killer virus outbreak not government cover ups, not helicopter chases and not dropping a bomb on innocent people in an effort to stop the spread of the disease. OK, well the dropping a bomb on innocent people part has potential, but it was just never realized. And speaking of unrealized potential: with such an impressive cast and Warner Brothers deep pockets OUTBREAK had the potential to be really good movie. Sadly, that didn't happen and now decades later OUTBREAK hasn't aged gracefully at all.

The actual outbreak scenes early on were interesting, but then when the story centers in around keeping the disease quarantined in the small city of Cedar Creek (a miniature representation of America, I guess) it falls apart. Uninspired dialogue, unrealistic reaction by the citizenry when they are taken over by the military, weak special effects, lame action scenes, predictable climax.

If you need me I'll be in my room watching EBOLA SYNDROME.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS (2011)

[Update 08/24/2021: Need to redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

I think I smiled the entire movie.

I don't want to tell you too much since the most exciting part of the film is having the wonderfully delicious story unfold, so I'll just say that Gil Pender (Owen Wilson) is a successful but unhappy Hollywood screenwriter. He's on a vacation in Paris with his self-centered fiancee Inez (Rachel McAdams) and her constantly belittling parents. He believes that if they move to Paris the beauty and cultural history of the city will inspire him to write the great novel that he feels is inside him. Rachel doesn't want to hear any of this and thinks that he's being stupid. As bad luck would have it they run into some friends of Inez's and this one dude, Paul, is a complete pseudo-intellectual asshole. He believes that he's an expert on fucking everything! He even gets in an argument with a tour guide at a museum! Gil senses that Inez sees Paul as vastly intellectually superior to Gil, like when Gil tries to interrupt Paul Inez shushes him and says "Gil, just pay attention. You might learn something.". Anyway, after yet another torturous evening of listening to Paul drone on and on about how brilliant he is, a very frustrated Gil goes for a walk. He's so deep in thought he ends up getting lost...and then at the stroke of midnight something magical happens.

I loved this movie and it was such a delight to see Woody back in his old form. I enjoyed it so much that I watched it twice!  As of right now MIDNIGHT IN PARIS is the best movie that I've seen from 2011. Highly recommended.