(PHOTO PROVIDED VIA GOOGLE)
***WARNING: REVIEW DOES CONTAIN HEAVY SPOILERS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK***
RATED: TV-MA
RUNNING TIME: 1 HOUR 42 MINUTES
RELEASE DATE: FEBRUARY 4,2018
DIRECTOR: Julius Onah
WRITERS: Oren Uziel and Doug Jung
STARRING:
Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Hamilton
David Oyelowo as Kiel
Daniel Bruhl as Schmidt
John Ortiz as Monk
Chris O'Dowd as Mundy
Ziyi Zhang as Tam
Elizabeth Debicki as Jensen
Donal Logue as Mark Stambler
(TRAILER PROVIDED VIA YOUTUBE)
I am a big fan of the original Cloverfield and I enjoyed 10 Cloverfield Lane. I was honestly intrigued about the origins of the original creature from the first film and I hoped that 10 Cloverfield Lane would answer some questions. It had only added to the mystery of the first film. There weren't really any true connections between the films at all. I always wondered if this franchise would continue. I received my answer a few days ago while on Google. I read about how there were two sequels and that the third entry to the series had finished filming and the fourth entry is only months away from wrapping.
JJ Abrams and his Bad Robot production company really know how to keep a secret. This was the first I've heard of either film. The article didn't reveal a release date for the third film nor did it reveal a title. All it said was that the third film would be released on a streaming service while the fourth would be released theatrically. What an odd way to release each film with the first of the two going straight to a home streaming service and then putting the next installment in theaters. I always figured that films go to the streaming service due to production companies not feeling the film can hold its own in theaters. Maybe this is just a stratedgy to get the Cloverfield name in our heads again. Who knows at this point.
Back to The Cloverfield Paradox. I was surprised yet again to see a trailer for the film already during Superbowl weekend after just reading this new article. Then I was surprised again when the film was released on Netflix on the next day from it's trailer premiere. It's Monday and the day after the Superbowl and I am already watching this new film in a series I love just days after reading that it wrapped filming. My mind is blown at this point.
In the article I read, The Cloverfield Paradox is supposed to finally answer a lot of the questions from the first film about the creature. This did not happened. I'm not sure where the author of the article received their information from but there is no hard explanation of that first installment of the franchise and it's monster. However, this film does confirm the fan theory of this franchise existing in a multiverse as our main characters do in fact enter another dimension and have to deal with multiversal consequences. How does this confirm fan theories? One theory from the first film was that the creature came from other dimension. Now again, there are no hard facts that actually support this except for a brief science type explanation of how tears in the fabric of space and time could seriously fuck shit up due to wack-a-do type experimentation during the beginning of the film that no one seems to listens to (why would they...jeez). But since we now know we are dealing with a multiverse (the scientific theory that no one listened to in the beginning of the film), the question of whether the creature was from another dimension can be seen as valid but not confirmed. This also explains why we see very different creatures in 10 Cloverfield Lane and why we don't hear anything about the first film. The fact that these films take place on different Earth's make these differences in the franchise make sense.
This film is very different from the first two in the series as it deals mainly with the fact that they are in a differently dimension. There are some surprises along the way that shows the ship (The Cloverfield Space Station) seeming to fight the crew during the film. There is one scene where the ship seems to eat one of the crewman's arms, but then it ends up coming back a little later on with the best Evil Dead impression I've seen since Evil Dead 2. The alternate reality seems to be effecting the ship and it's inhabitants in strange ways.
There is a big pay off at the end of The Cloverfield Paradox. After the remaining members of the crew are able to figure out how to get home. They get into the escape pods from the station and begin their descent to their Earth. As this is happening we end up finding out that their Earth is under attack from deadly creatures. This is the first mention of any sort of creature or monster in the film. Once the pod makes it into the atmosphere and through the clouds, we really get a treat. Finally, the original Cloverfield monster is back on the screen and we see a true connection between the films in the series. But then the movie ends. Still, I say it as a win and we finally got some sort of pay off.
I give The Cloverfield Paradox a solid 3 out of 5 stars. The story was okay and not what I had grown to expect from the rest of the franchise. See how movies can be influenced by other mediums? There were some great actors in the film that I knew and recognized. And we finally got to see the Cloverfield monster again. I just hope the 4th installment (Cloverfield Overlord) continues the story and we learn more about the beast. I hate how we never got the story of where the monster came from.
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