Cloverfield

Just saw the monster flick Cloverfield. Good special effects (monsters are intense), proper level of dread, and, for once, a real sense of what happens when people confront the frightening unknown up close and personal. Using hi def hand held cameras, director Matt Reeves achieves the kind of "you are participating in a chaotic event writ large" feeling impossible to achieve using the usual steady cams, tripods or dollies to control how cameras record a scene.

No doubt this film will succeed so the next questions to ask are: How did the monsters come to Manhattan? What is the final outcome? and... Are there more of them?

Great fun as the dialog works, the actors are good and this novel approach to doing this over done genre of film making is fresh. Unfortunately, copy cats will abound so theater goers will see the motion sickness treatment of hand held cinematography done on future slasher/vampire/monster flicks that need a "new look" to cover up the same ole same ole story line that started off with the great originals Frankenstein and Dracula (aka Vlad III the impaler).