Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)

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Posted by Matt Russell (Member # 8989) on 03-12-2016, 11:22 PM:

Talk about an unexpected surprise! 10 Cloverfield Lane should definitely not be looked upon as a sequel or even prequel to the 2008 movie Cloverfield. It works pretty much enterally on it's own, which is unique in the modern film age of "every sequel or spin-off is connected in one or another". There's only one thing in this movie that connects it to that Cloverfield.

Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
The address of the bunker is indeed, 10 Cloverfield Lane

Anyways, the movie is about a woman named Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), who after breaking up with her boyfriend,

Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
who is voiced on a voicemail message by Bradley Cooper.

She winds up in a car accident and next thing she knows, she's in a basement. She meets her "housekeeper", Howard (played by the great John Goodman), who tells her that everyone outside is dead. There's also another guy stuck in the bunker, Emmett (John Gallagher Jr), who agrees with Howard that everyone else is gone. Well, things go topsy turvy, and Michelle attacks Howard in attempt to flee, and ends up finding a woman who's been "attacked" outside begging for help (this isn't a spoiler, it's shown in the ads). So she goes back to the bunker, and you start to feel sorry for Howard...

Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
Until we find out adopted a girl after his real daughter, Megan, moved away, only to kill her and he's treating Michelle as the daughter he wishes he had. He also caused her car crash in order to bring her to the bunker.

Fast forwarding a bit, and a lot actually happens in this setting. There's some great character development moments, and there's one scene in particular between Michelle and Emmett sharing their personal regrets that is actually kind of touching. The rest is explained in the spoilers, if you dare to look.

Spoiler Alert - Click to Toggle
Cutting to the chase, Howard kills Emmett, making him the "monster", which causes Michelle to kill Howard out of revenge by spilling acid on him. She escapes the bunker, finds out that everything is alright on the outside, except for ALIENS. Yes, aliens have been attacking earth in the meantime. And they look like something out of the Alien franchise. The movie ends with her driving to Houston in order to join a group of rebels set on winning the "war against aliens". Bring on the extended universe!

So yeah, 10 Cloverfield Lane isn't particularly a new idea and it still left me with some questions, but between the solid character development, legitimately evil villain, and fun story and great plot twist, it's a fun time at the movie and I'm sure this is bound to get real sequels to form a "Cloververse".
Film: 3 and a half out of 4 stars
Presentation: 3 of 4 stars (screen was alright, except there were noticeable marks when there were scenes that had lots of panning around. Sound was fantastic though, really pushed on the bass.)

Posted by Jonathan M. Crist (Member # 413) on 03-13-2016, 01:43 PM:

Cloverfield Lane is really a combination of Jean Paul Satre's 1946 existential play "No Exit" combined with the pilot episode of "The Twilight Zone" from 1959 entitled "Where is Everybody?".

No Exit has been filmed a couple of times before: Once in 1962 with screenplay by Orson Wells (alt title: Sinners Go To Hell) and more recently as a straight up horror movie in 2008.

Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 03-13-2016, 11:20 PM:

CINEMA: Cinemark Altoona and XD, Altoona, IA
AUDITORIUM: 8
PRESENTATION: Cinemark XD (Extreme Douchebag Cinema) 4K Illuminated by freaking Barco lasers with Auro sound and Recline-O-Vision
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: None [Cool]

RATING: Two and one half stars (out of four)

THE PLOT: A girl gets in a car crash. Wackiness ensues.

I won't describe the movie any more than Matt did. This is one of those you want to go into knowing as little as possible. Because once you know and have seen it, I don't think you're ever going to have a reason to want to watch it again. It's good, you're not going to hate it or anything, but when it comes down to you and the wife finding something to watch on date night at home in six months and it's down to this and some Nicholas Sparks nonsense, even you will be like "Eh, we already know what happens.".

Posted by Geoff Jones (Member # 3668) on 03-13-2016, 11:42 PM:

Loved it.

Read nothing about it. Just go see it.

Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 03-14-2016, 02:41 AM:

When I saw the trailer, I was pretty interested in this movie until I saw the title, "10 Cloverfield Lane." I thought, "Aw...shit...not ANOTHER one of those damned shaky movies!"

I wrote this movie off my list, simply because of the word "Cloverfield" in the title.

While I haven't got too much of a problem with shaky picture in parts of a movie, used for dramatic effect, I do not like to watch a movie shot entirely in shaky-cam. I actively avoid movies that have any more than a modest amount of it.

The association that "Cloverfield" in the title made with the first movie with that title instantly put me off this movie...to the point of disappointment.

In reality, there is very little in "10 Cloverfield Lane" that is the same as the first movie, "Cloverfield." There is only a loose association between the two movies. They are totally different.

John Goodman does a really good job playing the part of the creepy guy. Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays the heroine well, strong and smart but with emotion. I, personally, hate the stereotypical, crying, sniveling heroine that is common in so many horror/suspense movies, today. Winstead is not one of those.

I liked the ending quite a bit. So many movies of this type fall flat at the end but this one did not. The final scene, at the end, of the movie when Winstead makes her decision on which way to turn will make you say, "Hoo-Yeah!"

In reality, there is nothing in "10 Cloverfield Lane" with the first movie, "Cloverfield." There is only a loose association between the two movies. They are totally different.

Do not let the title put you off the movie!
I am glad I went to the theater to watch "10 Cloverfield Lane."
It was worth the price of admission.

Posted by Marcel Birgelen (Member # 6801) on 03-14-2016, 03:25 AM:

Apparently, it also started as a project that was entirely unrelated to Cloverfield. The idea of making this a so called "blood relative" to Cloverfield was introduced late in the movie making process. Filming ended in December 2014, so they waited for more than a year to actually release it.

Weather or not it's set in the same universe remains a bit vague, but there are definitely some connections.

To me, the similarities with Dan Trachtenberg's 2011 short movie were also quite apparent.

Posted by Mark Ogden (Member # 43) on 03-14-2016, 02:56 PM:

I thought that both this movie and its reason for being were bullish*t. At the end of the day this is a pretty tedious hostage drama that has had some sci-fi elements grafted onto it, with the name "Cloverfield" added to get people to the box-office (and that shot of the mailbox was foolish. If the original film was so titled because the found-footage was part of "Project Cloverfield", and THIS film is so titled because the guy lives on Cloverfield Lane, what is the larger connection? I have a buddy who lives near a "Cloverfield Dairy" outside of Boston. Guess I'd better warn him to look out for monsters). Ms. Winstead is pretty and a fine actress, and can be credited for carrying the picture, but it adds up to nothing. The producers admit this started out as an unrelated screenplay. It winds up feeling like a quickly tossed-off something-or-other thrown by J.J. Abrams to fans of the original while he works in the Star Trek/Star Wars universes. Insulting.

Posted by Marcel Birgelen (Member # 6801) on 03-15-2016, 04:41 PM:

Well, to the defense of this movie: Maybe it actually tries to do something new to the idea of a "Franchise".

Not something that's in-your-face connected by being a prequel, sequel or side-story in some pretty laid-out universe, but rather something that lets you connect the dots, if there are any.

Personally, I do like this kind of "mystery approach", it also gives you some input for discussions afterwards. And even if it actually was a hack, not all hacks are equally bad.

Posted by Terry Monohan (Member # 8285) on 03-20-2016, 10:58 AM:

We watched this movie last week at the UltraStar Desert Cinmeas near Palm Springs CA. Shown in a old Imax cinema that Imax has moved out of and they took off many feet of screen height at the top.No masking now. A movie that kept me on the edge of my seat. The problem was the aisle led lights on the floor on the bottom of the large screen shined up on the right and left corners and ruined the image on the screen. The movie had some great sound as they did have the latest Barco 11.1 sound system in place. I enjoyed the juke box in the bunker in the movie as they played It often.

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 04-28-2016, 03:20 AM:

Every few years a movie comes along that I will play here because I want to watch it myself. I tried to find a spot to slot 10 Cloverfield Lane into simply because I want to see it, and now I'll be playing it this weekend.

10 Cloverfield Lane is almost a stage play in that most of it takes place in a very small area with a tiny cast, and it takes no small amount of skill by the actors to keep the story rolling.

The tight quarters, small cast, and the non-stop tension and mystery reminds me of The Cold Equations, which is another movie that I enjoyed the hell out of some years back (though I'm pretty sure I watched that one on television).

10 Cloverfield Lane is a marvellous movie. Hopefully there will be a reasonable number of people who want to see it other than just me.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 07-14-2016, 04:44 PM:

holy s*** - I missed this in the theater but recently watched the bluray and while my system is only 6.1 - the audio is off the charts ... and oh that ending [either you loved it or hated it, I was in the former]