Blair Witch meets Godzilla. That pretty much sums up Cloverfield -- but in a good way. The filmmakers took the "What if a giant (insert monster here) attacks New York and we shoot it like The Blair Witch Project with a single hand-held camera" approach. You know, that old gag. In the context of this film, this technique actually works quite well. We only see the story from the view point of a single camera as experienced by some good-looking 20 somethings.

The story goes like this: A 50+ story tall monster hits Manhattan on the eve of Rob Hawkins' (played by Michael Stahl-David) departure to a job in Japan. All his friends are gathered for a final farewell party. We get a set-up of a minor love story that supposed to be the driving motivation for the film, but never really works. But that's ok, because in just a few minutes BOOM! All hell breaks loose as some unseen monster starts ripping the city to shreds. We don't know why. We don't know how. All we know is, they have to get out of Manhattan -- fast. Alas, Rob Hawkins gets a call from his true love Beth McIntyre (played by Odette Yustman) who's injured and trapped in her apartment on the other side of town -- directly in the path of the monster no doubt. So, for no other reason than pure love, he and his friends (one of whom happened to be taping at the party) decide to go along with him. There's no real reason for them to go along, but they do anyway (plus, we need some girls to save from the monster, and we need the funny guy to make jokes along the way). The characters' motivations are all flimsy, but they're just barely believable enough for us to accept their journey. So, off they go to save the girl.

What I really liked about this film was the impending sense of dread we feel through the lens of designated goof-ball, Hud Platt (T.J. Miller). He's documenting all of this for the sake of posterity…because "somebody will want to know what happened here" as he says. We see shots that unfortunately, are all too familiar of NY buildings collapsing and the streets filling with smoke and ash. As the monster gets closer, its destruction is unstoppable making the puny humans trying to escape no more resilient than ants. There's plenty of tantalizing destruction and monster mayhem kept just out of view of the camera, but eventually (thankfully), we get plenty of footage of the monster (who's really cool in my opinion).

Since the camera is supposed to be amateur and hand-held, the shots can be hard to watch from all the shaky, running, movement, but that actually adds to the tension of the chaos. And I really love that it just feels like "some guy" with a camera, and not a professional camera man just trying to look like an amateur. And although there are many scenes where any sane person in such a horrific experience would simply drop the camera and run, we need to see what's going on, obviously. And I can sort of buy the argument as to why Hud holds onto his camera for dear life: in a world where video has become the medium of fact, Hud realizes how valuable a video record will be when this is all over. Plus, he's a bit of a doofus, so his attachment to anything that makes him the center of attention is believable. And besides that, Hud actually has lots of comic relief lines in the film. And they're actually funny.

So, even though Hud is hardly on camera (since he's behind it) he's the real driving force in this film. Although Rob's sometimes unbelievable obsession to save the girl he loves (which was never properly established in my opinion) is supposed to be the focus (or co-focus to the monster), it's really the goof-ball Hud who makes his documentary footage an honest experience of a monster knocking everything to hell. In that sense, the film isn't so much about plot as it is about experience. Better than any reality show, the film is simply an experience of fear and desperation regular people might feel in the same circumstance.

All-in-all, I really liked this film. It's not very meaty, but it's plenty entertaining. There are lots of jaw-dropping moments, and truly scary shots. There are no social or political messages. No spiritual awakenings. Just a big-ass monster tearing the crap out of Manhattan. And that's enough for me.