Cloverfield

The first big movie of the year turned out to be a very small movie. J.J. Abrams took the monster movie genre and turned it on its head.
When I hear monster movie, I think lots of special effects, big creatures, explosions, and an epic battle for the safety of the city. Even the pitiful Godzilla flick with Matthew Brodrick stuck to form. The monster shows up and wreaks havoc. The army comes in and does battle with the monster. A group of scientist work feverishly to understand the monster and find its weakness. In the end, the monster is destroyed (or driven back into dormancy). The world continues as normal. Everything about these movies are big. The monster is a major character. The plot is centered on the fight against the movie. Everything in the movie happens because of the monster.
In Cloverfield, the monster is the catalyst for the action. The monster does show up and wreak havoc. The army does do battle with the monster. However, the monster is not a major character. The plot does not center on the fight against the monster. Nobody is focused on understanding the monster or finding its weakness. The monster and the fight against the monster are simply plot pieces. They create the situations the characters react to, but they are not explored.
So, Cloverfield is not a monster movie. It is just an action movie. The story is told Blair Witch style. We see the action unfold on a handheld video camera. We watch as a group of friends try to cope with a horrific situation. They race through the city in an attempt to rescue a friend and then escape the city. They face death, the military, run ins with the monster, collapsing buildings, and a deadline before the city is destroyed.
While the action kept me on the edge of my seat, I cannot say I loved the movie. The characters were thin and their central motivation was not compelling. I didn't believe that the main character and the girl they rush to rescue are that in love. The movie does not do the work to make it believable. The supporting characters are more believable.
Cloverfield is a good movie. It puts an interesting twist on the monster movie genre. However, the story falls short of greatness.

"Shut up, you old bag," would be impolite

But do tell: What do you when you're in the theater and your fellow movie-goers are talking through the film?

When I went to see, "Before the Devil Know You're Dead," last night at the West Newton Cinema, we were relegated to one of the tinier theaters upstairs, with few seats and much fewer audience members.

But a couple of minutes into the movie, two women walked in, talking in regular voices as they found their seats - just a few over from mine. The continued to talk and soon, again in a regular speaking voice, asked me, "Did it just start?" I nodded in the affirmative, hoping they'd get the hint that I wasn't up for a conversation.

And through every twist and turn in the plot, the two shared their feelings with everyone in the theater.

I've been known, on occassion, to kindly ask folks to quiet down in the movies, but I'm always a bit shy about it. I was scathing, but kept my mouth shut in this instance.

When the credits rolled, and everyone began collect their belongings and leave, the man seated in front of me looked at them, and very quickly - as if he'd been rehearsing it in his head throughout the flick, said, "If you're going to talk through the movie, next time, would you move your seats away from eveyone?"

They looked baffled and one woman replied, "What, were we talking? Well, you could have moved YOUR seat."

Sigh.

'Before the Devils Knows You're Dead'

As someone who loves seeing and hearing different points of view, and utimately waiting for the moment when they all converge, I enjoyed, "Before the Devil Knows Your Dead," even if the plot relies too heavily on viewers to fill in emotional blanks.

The story, which boils down to how far over the line - between good and evil - folks are willing to venture for money, is an intriguing one. The idea becomes even more complex when the potential sacrifice for money is not only morality, but family.

And tossing Phillip Seymour Hoffman into the lead role to illustrate the hypothetical is always a good move. Adding yet another distinct character to his repetoire, Hoffman is stellar as the ruthless, but somehow vaguely sympathetic Andy, who solicits his younger brother to rob their parents jewelry store.

The changing point of view, though not a new technique, also had a refreshing twist. Viewers travel back and forth in time, watching days unfold for each character, but not necessarily from each character's perspective. When we're given the textual cue that we'll be seeing Andy's day unfold, for example, we see him, not his point of view, i.e., the camera is focused on him, not what he's seeing.

The film is innovative, well acted and suspenseful, but leaves quite a bit to the viewers imagination. Character's don't necessarily make quick transformations, or many senses, any transformation, but they make serious, life-altering decisions, while the audience gets only snippets of their motivation.

Overall it's worth seeing for entertainment's sake, and as a conversation starter about morality, but don't look too deep in the film itself for answers.