This review may contain spoilers.
At a certain point the Powers That Be decided that the Cloverfield brand would be developed as an anthology sci-fi horror series. I suppose this was born out of the fact that it’s hard to make a sequel to a found footage film, especially considering the ending of Cloverfield, and the fact that film studios seem to have some kind of mandate that only as a last resort can they even entertain the idea of producing an original film that isn’t tied to a franchise or existing intellectual property or that has some kind of pre-existing brand recognition. It must have been in the fine print with whatever deal they signed with the Devil. And so eight years after the original Cloverfield, we got 10 Cloverfield Lane, and then two years after that we got The Cloverfield Paradox, whether we liked it or not. I guess, thank you Satan?
10 Cloverfield Lane is linked to Cloverfield only through the Cloverfield name and J.J. Abrams’ production company, Bad Robot. Again, I think the brand name usage is a pretty cynical ploy by producers trying to build on the success of an otherwise completely unrelated film. But then again, having an anthology series like Creepshow or V/H/S isn’t in itself a bad thing, and as long as we’re getting some quality movies out of the deal, then I guess it’s all worthwhile?
And 10 Cloverfield Lane, while not quite as good as the original Cloverfield, is still a compelling horror film in its own right. Though it doesn’t quite stick the landing, 10 Cloverfield Lane offers an intriguing premise. Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) wakes up after a car crash to find herself chained to the wall in a locked room with an IV in her arm and her clothes and personal effects in a neat pile in the corner. I mean, hey, we’ve all been there before, right? Having been on the road running from what’s hinted at as an abusive relationship fuelled by addiction issues, Michelle is understandably even more on her guard than normal and immediately tries to reach her cell phone to call for help, but to no avail as this is a horror movie, so all phone service is dead (unless you’re using Nokia, which as the original Cloverfield showed has, has unbeatable nation-wide coverage at affordable rates). She’s soon introduced to her captor, Howard, played to creepy perfection by John Goodman who is purposefully cast to play against type to great effect. Known to millions as the loving and loveable patriarch of the Connor clan in the seminal sitcom Roseanne as well as other typical “good guy” roles, it adds a layer of tension to what might be an otherwise pretty straightforward single-loaction claustrophobic horror/thriller.
Goodman’s Howard is an ex-Navy man, a doomsday prepper, and a conspiracy theorist whose family left him because his ex-wife “turned his daughter against him.” Immediately, his motives seem suspect, as of course chaining anybody up and locking them in an underground bunker is an insane thing to do. But then he also feeds Michelle and nurses her back to health. But then he also informs her that there was some kind of attack, whether nuclear, chemical, or extraterrestrial in nature, and that the air outside is contaminated as a result, and so they must remain in the bunker for at least a year or two with perpetual third wheel Emmett (John Howard Gallagher Jr.) until the chemicals or nuclear fallout or alien virus dissipate to safe levels. Emmett complicates the viewer’s perspective even more because not only was he not abducted by Howard, the way he tells it there actually was an attack of some kind, and having helped Howard build the bunker, rushes over and literally fights his way in.
Perhaps I’ve been ruined by snippets online in the eight years since the release of 10 Cloverfield Lane of people talking about some kind of twist. And so, when Howard turns out not to be lying and actually starts showing signs of genuine hospitality and moments of human empathy, I began to question my own perceptions of the character and thought maybe the twist was going to be that Howard would seem like a maniac, but was just a pragmatist / conspiracy theorist with incredibly poor people skills who genuinely rescued a young maiden from the side of the road and chained her up because he genuinely thought he was doing the right thing and just has trouble picking up on social cues.
But then, no, Howard is the villain he seemed to be at the beginning, and he presumably killed not only his daughter but at least one other girl who vaguely resembled his daughter and is likely a serial killer. The twist turned out to be that Howard’s wildest conspiracy theory turned out to be true. Once Michelle does eventually escape the bunker of horrors after burning Howard with a vat of his own acid (you know like we all keep in hidden compartments under our kitchen sinks) and then with some good, plain, old-fashioned fire, she’s confronted by alien invaders. That is, hostile extraterrestrials and not refugees from another country, though guessing from Howard’s background and the fact that the movie is set within striking distance of Houston, Texas, I’m going to say that it’s a pretty fair bet that at least a couple of his conspiracy theories revolved around invading migrant caravans and Jewish space lasers. The twist was OK, I guess, but felt a little unnecessary given an otherwise effectively tight thriller, and I think the better ending would have been a more ambiguous send off with Michelle striking out looking for help and coming across something that made her question her reality in keeping with the underlying theme of abuse and emotional manipulation. Also, giant, three-story-tall aliens being taken out with a single Molotov cocktail was a kind of baffling choice that reminded me of A Quiet Place in that the methods the protagonists of both films used to defeat the alien invaders really called into question how these extraterrestrial aggressors managed to last more than 30 seconds against any of Earth’s standing armies.
10 Cloverfield Lane was the directorial debut of Dan Trachtenberg, who has gone on to be the shepherd of the Predator franchise, rescuing it from the abysmal lows of Aliens vs Predator: Requiem and The Predator, which in any sane universe would have marked not only the end of the franchise and movie jail followed by actual jail for all those involved in their productions. Instead, Trachtenberg followed up with not one but three excellent Predator films that I didn’t know I needed. And it’s all because of 10 Cloverfield Lane. While I think it’s a step down from the original Cloverfield, it’s only just, and I suspect that up another rewatch, my rating may go up if it changes. We all have our hang-ups, and one of mine is any movie that has the wacko conspiracy theorist turn out to be correct. It just doesn’t sit well with me these days considering the proliferation of misinformation. As it is, I’m still stoked that I blind bought 10 Cloverfield Lane 4k steelbook (shoutout to Chumleighs in Kingston, ON, who deal in used movies and video games, but unlike some other similar shops do not unwrap factory sealed products) and it turned out to be an actually good movie, which is not always the case in these situations.
10 CLOVERFIELD LANE
2016
director: Dan Trachtenberg
starring: John Goodman – Mary Elizabeth Winstead – John Gallagher Jr.
genre: science fiction – thriller – horror – drama
runtime: 104 minutes