Cloverfield Sequel, Invisible Woman Planned

Paramount has official confirmed what everyone suspected would happen - a Cloverfield sequel is in the works with Director Matt Reeves, Writer Drew Goddard and Producer JJ Abrams. The talk is early, no real plans just ideas being throw around like telling the attack from perspective of a different group.

In addition the trio planning on making "Invisible Woman" which is described as "a Hitchcock-style thriller that probes the mind of a former beauty queen who turns to a life of crime to protect her family."

The preliminary plan is for them to do Cloverfield sequel first followed by Invisible Woman. Personally I wouldn't mind seeing a more epic disaster film that "Godzilla" wasn't rather then just steadi-cam stuff. Or assuming the budget isn't there; the man on the street perspective is fine but follows a company of soldiers so really get into the thick of the action rather then the peripheral. (source)

Cloverfield Takes Hit In Second Week

Week two weekend of Cloverfield wasn't as good as its $41 million first week. The movie experienced a 68% drop, losing out to this weeks new releases. Instead, Meet the Spartans took the number 1 spot following by Rambo, 27 Dresses, then Cloverfield.

Week 2 Box Office
1: Meet the Spartans - $18.7 million
2: Rambo - $18.2 million
3: 27 Dresses - $13.6 million
4: Cloverfield - $12.7 million
5: Untraceable - $11.2 million

Do You Have CBS?

Do you have Cloverfield Barf Syndrome? The symptom is barfing after seeing Cloverfield. Apparently the problem has become enough of an issue that theatres are starting to post warning signs.

According the CNN, the movie is causing vertigo in some but not most people. Verigo is caused when a person's balancing system gets confused where it feels its in motion even when its not which can be caused by a camera jerking constantly on a movie screen. How much a person can be effected varies so really the only way to know for sure is see the movie and find out for yourself.

Tips to avoid vertigo include some over the counter medicine such as Bonine and Dramamine II. More simply, just close your eyes for a few moments multiple times during the movie to restore your bodies equilibrium. If all else fails, wait until you can rent or buy the movie. A smaller tv screen surrounded by other objects will less likely confuse your brain.

If you or a friend got CBS, be sure to tell the story in the comments.

Cloverfield Toy Available

Hasbro has announced that the monster from Cloverfield is now available in toy form at their store (here). The item costs $99.99 plus S&H and currently no picture is available. Its says the item will ship on 09/30 but how long the pre-order will be available isn't mentioned.

According to the site:

Cloverfield Movie Monster product imagery unveiling is coming soon!

Cloverfield Monster Features:
70 points of articulation and incredible life-like detail
Authentic sound
14” tall
10 parasites
Two interchangeable heads (calm or agitated)
Statue of Liberty head accessory
Special Cloverfield collector’s edition packaging
In conjunction with the launch of the highly anticipated CLOVERFIELD movie release, Hasbro, in a partnership with Bad Robot and Paramount Pictures, has produced a super-articulated and highly detailed limited collector’s edition Cloverfield Monster.

The Cloverfield monster is available exclusively through HasbroToyShop.com. Reserve your Cloverfield monster today to have the opportunity to receive it when it ships later this year. Limited quantities are available.

Weekend Box Office Estimate

The weekend is sadly over and Cloverfield has an outstanding weekend. Not quite the $50 million estimate but probably once MLK holiday numbers are tossed in it might be. The film opened in 3411 theatres, making $12,019 per theatre for an estimated total of $41 million. The previous record holder for MLK weekend was Black Hawk Down with $33.6 million and previous January record holder was Star Wars: Special Edition with $35.9 million.

Top 5 for the weekend:
1: Cloverfield - $41.0 million
2: 27 Dresses - $22.3 million
3: The Bucket List - $15.1 million
4: Juno - $10.2 million
5: National Treasure: Book of Secrets - $8.1 million

Cloverfield Rolls In Some Friday Dollars

Cloverfield has only been out one day and already made a hefty $18.25 million just for Friday. From Dark Horizon, "The number puts it on course to earn just over $50 million for the long weekend, easily shattering the best January opening record held by "Star Wars: Special Edition" with $35.9 million, and the Martin Luther King holiday weekend record which "Black Hawk Down" had with $33.6 million." I smell sequel.

Uh Oh Mass Media Reviews Cloverfield

The movie is out! Mass media give its opinion as do some fans. While the online publications have embraced the movie, it appears the old stalwarts of mass media are less then thrilled with it. Be sure to comment on what you think.

Entertainment Weekly - B+; Liked the action, hated the first 20 minutes, found the characters dull.

Austin Chronicle - 4 stars; enjoyed "Reeves' direction...sylistically invisible screenplay that dispenses entirely with any and all genre rules."

NY Times - 3/5 rating; "this new monster is nothing more than a blunt instrument designed to smash and grab without Freudian complexity or political critique...film is too dumb to offend anything except your intelligence, and the monster does cut a satisfying swath through the cast, so your only complaint may be, What took it so long?"

NY Post - "...combines unpleasantness and stupidity to a degree that would be difficult to match unless you were stuck in bed with a case of the shingles"

Washington Post - "Dialogue that consists largely of OH MY GOD!!? The anti-cinematic aesthetic that is coming to govern our visual lives? All of the above, plus another slimy monster, engaged in an extreme makeover of Manhattan."

LA Weekly - "cheap and opportunistic", "Cloverfield's first-person ?videography has little sense of purpose" and "screenplay that seems to be out on strike"

Film Threat - 3.5 stars; Overall good review, didn't like the bland characters, and found it "clever enough."

Premiere Magazine - 3 stars; One of the few reviewers that like the "convincing chemistry" of the cast. Noted don't see the monster much but didn't mind.

AICN Capone Review - "CLOVERFIELD, at its core, is a lightning-strike awesome monster movie."

From Reelzchannel, fans comment after seeing the film (but its semi-advertisement so...).

Cloverfield

As of this point (6:40EST) Rotten Tomatoes is showing that 78% of the critics where favorable with average rating of 6.9/10 while site users where with 53% favorable, 5.1/10 average rating. Of note though is while the critics hovered in the 3-4 range for their reviewing, the fans basically either loved it or hated it.

More Cloverfield Reviews

2 Days and counting and Cloverfield hits theatres. Yesterday was the sneak peak in several cities across the countries so reviews should start becoming plentiful. Also of note is verification that JJ Abrams current project does have a teaser trailer for Star Trek XI attached (description here). Most of the reviews come from AICN, all enjoyed the movie, expressed love for the character Hud, but did have reservations.

Quint Review - Good movie but warns of high expectations. It entertains but does contain "shallow character work" and maybe 6-7 minutes of the various actual monsters is seen total.

Latauro Review - Thought the monster was great, enjoyed the realism, found the "Dawson's Creek" 20 minute get to know them opening tedious and fake, and had moments that where contrived.

Massawym Review - Absolutely freaking loved the movie. The entire review is a love letter to the film creator's.

Dark Horizon's Review - Notes that having to high expectations could kill your enjoyment, if go in knowing its Blair Witch Project style mixed with Godzilla and nothing more, will enjoy the "effective thrill ride." Warns that the shaky cam is much worse then the Bourne films. Was not impressed with the "underwritten good looking...yuppies and slackers...stock roles." To sum: "A fun but forgettable B-movie ride."

15 AICN Fan Reviews - Mixed reviews from AICN site fans. A mixed bag so probably a good source to determine if the movie is for you since its a fan versus reviewer approach.

Newsarama Review - Enjoyed the film, the realism, and the approach. Not so happy about the dull first 20 minutes.

Update: Added more reviews above.

Cloverfield Production Notes

JJAbrams.net has scored the official production notes of Cloverfield from Paramount. It covers alot of the process of putting Cloverfield together and worth a read.

The notes are spread across six posts on the site forum. Click here to begin.

Some highlights:
- Movie started as idea from a toy store visit in Japan and seeing Godzilla on the store shelves.
- Went from a five page treatment to 58 page outline from Drew Goddard over Christmas 2006 which was pitched to Paramount execs Brad Weston and Brad Grey.
- Matt Reeves, director of the film, was childhood friend of JJ Abrams, was chosen as cared about character in film and "apply a scrutiny to the heart of each character".
- 1st act is a 20 minutes, get to know the characters party sequence and then things kick off with the head of the Statue of Liberty landing nearby.
- A parallel story is footage between Rob and Beth and their relationship.
- The Hud character only point of view was born out of YouTube where can find videos that capture other people's reactions to events.
- This created a challenge since couldn't do the usual coverage and tossed out most of "the usual cinematic tools" resulting in the replication "of a novice using a video camera" to capture the "chaos around him." For example, just missing creature sightings and other events or starting the action in the middle of it rather then the usual before, during and after. So to sum, you professional cameramen trying to act unprofessional, while professionally recording events as needed by the director and the script.
- In casting, wanted to avoid "instantly recognizable faces" to help create realism. Also helps on the budget.
- Hud (TJ Miller) is the film camera man with a sense of humor that is rarely scene but provides the voice and heart of the movie.
- The informal name of the monster is "Clover" who is a "baby...confused, disoriented and irritable...and down in the water for thousands and thousands of years." Also confused and angry about the new environment, NYC, and the annoying things hurting him (humans).
- The 25-story monster design from Neville Page who also just finished work on James Cameron's Avatar and currently on Star Trek XI.
- From design it went to Tippett Studio "to implement and refine the monster" in CGI for the shots its in.
- Part of the "post-birth ritual" includes itching itself on a building, releasing parasites that cause further havoc.
- The parasites are a result of makin the human interaction relevant with a one on one struggle. They are "voracious, rabid, bounding nature, but they also have a crab-like crawl...viciousness of a dog, but with the ability to climb walls and stick to things."
- The film title, Cloverfield is based off a street near Abrams' office. "Greyshot" was one title, based off bridge two characters hide under, that was almost used. Since Cloverdield became the name the film was known by (other then "1-18-08") decided to just stick with it.
- The Statue of Liberty headshot used in the first teaser trailer in June was creating by Hammerhead Productions on the Paramount back lot and enhanced by Double Negative for use in the final film. The shot is a homage to 1981 film "Escape from New York".
- Tippett Studio and Double Negative also did the CGI for the many collapsing building in the film, with YouTube providing visual reference to help in the realism. Further realism was added by basically recreating the building inside and out with model floors, furniture, glass, etc so that when collapsed the physics would be realistic.
- The handheld POV camera "multipled [the visual effects] challenge exponentially" since the camera shakes, jerks and zooms had to be traked by hand, frame by frame, rather then by computer.
- The Brooklyn Bridge doesn't survive the film unscathed, its destruction filmed by The Downey Stages using a constructed 50ft section to film panics people leaving their cars, this was then inserted onto a CGI bridge with the 1940 collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge used as reference for how a real suspension bridge would collapse.

Newsrama Mike Vogel Interview

Newsarama has posted an interview with Mike Vogel, one of the stars of Cloverfield. Not much in new information is covered. Usual stories about the secrecy, challenge of the project, the Alias auditions and so forth.

The full interview is here.

Cloverfield Photo Gallery and Other Things

Reelz Channel has posted a picture gallery from Cloverfield. In addition they have a brief video that discusses viral marketing used by Hollywood for various movies. Also Paramount decided to make a real prop of the headless Statue of Liberty to help promote the film.

The viral marketing video and photo gallery is here (click "Photos" tab).

Nine More TV Spots

With Cloverfield only days away, the number of TV spots for this movie is getting quite large. The marketing department for this movie must having a ball editing these things. So if the site loads a little slow, it might be the 18 or so TV spots that now exist. Thinking I might need to remove the trailers sidebar and replace with links if this keeps up. All the below brought to you thanks to Cloverfield Clues.
TV Spot #10 - Some Thing Has Found Us

TV Spot #11 - Discover the Secret

TV Spot #12 - Who Would You Save

TV Spot #13 - Cobra Mix

TV Spot #14 - Breathe

TV Spot #15 - Extreme

TV Spot #16 - Impossible

TV Spot #17 - See It

TV Spot #18 - Arrived

Cloverfield Premiere Review

Apparently the other day Cloverfield premiered and a few websites where apparently invited. Below are reviews about the film, all of which are very positive about the film. Another constant is that if you are prone to motion sickness, want to take meds before seeing the movie. Click the link below to read the reviews. I will add more as I find them.

Ain't It Cool News - "Utterly Brilliant." and "It is all at once art, commercial and grotesquely gleefully gargantuan."

Hollywood Elsewhere - "Cloverfield is a monster film unlike any other -- a complete original, but no less of a rock' em-sock 'em for that. It's amazing in that it's so short (by my watch about 74 minutes without credits), and yet so fierce."

Kid Reviewer - About the monster: "It was as if they took parts of sea animals, through in some extra arms and legs, and put them in a blender 400 hundred feet tall" with craplike critters that also attack (he compared them to Starcraft's Zerg). On the camera POW: "...very realistic, and helped create a sense of panic and fear" but "...camera is very shaky and downright dizzying at times" and noted the viral marketing campaign isn't important to the film at all.

Dint Factor - "It is a monster movie, but not in the traditional sense. It's a love story. It's a story about obsession. About one man's obsession with this girl, and about how after he blew it a monster attacks the city. This gives him that one more chance to go and save her." Said this pic, is pretty close approximation of the monster and warned "Many will find this unsatisfying. The movie, that is. They'll complain about the lack of answers, and the abrupt ending."

Florida Venture Blog - Liked the monster, the way the POW amped up the action, personal backstory, "Hud the Stud". Disliked how short it was and some motion sickness it caused.

Two More Cloverfield Spots

Here you go, two more Cloverfield spots available for your enjoyment bring the total to nine.

TV Spot #8 - Incredible


TV Spot #9 - Witness

Another Matt Reeves Interview

Matt Reeves has another interview about Cloverfield online. Its pretty amazing to me how much this guy is getting around in promoting the film, more then the actors themselves which is unusual. Any case in the interview he discusses why he joined the project, the origin of the title of the movie and other things.

The full interview, one of the best, yet is here.

Highlights:
- Joined movie because liked JJ Abrams and writer Drew Goddard and found the movie outline interesting due to character approach and the filming style it needed.
- Same story about the teaser trailer and decision to release it without a title, with effort to generate the same curiosity that Close Encounters of the Third Kind did for them when they where kids.
- Enjoyed the unusual shooting style. Also edits and cuts are done as if the camera was cut off rather then the usual jumping around and coverage of closeups and the like. Also used for the passage of time within the film.
- "The whole aesthetic was supposed to be that if this happened to anyone in the audience and they had been there with their video-phone or their camera, that they would never turn off their camera until there was a reason to turn off the camera."
- The monster is NOT inspired by H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu.
- The movie, to a degree, was inspired by a visit to Japan by JJ Abrams and his son during promotion of Mission Impossible 3. After seeing a toy store and the popularity of Godzilla there he decided that the US needed "our own national monster."
- Watched several movies to prepare for the Cloverfield shoot including Children of Men, Alien, Jaws, and The Shining. Also looked at YouTube videos (example here at 2:32 point) and the like.
- The actors improvised alot during the filming, often times would do 50-60 takes for a scene. At the time of casting their was no script (explaining the use of Alias scripts for the audition).
- The name Cloverfield was the result of a miscommunication with Drew Goddard. It was supposed to be Cloverdale, named after the street by JJ Abrams' old office.

Cloverfield Sneak Preview 1-15

According to Slashfilm.com, a sneak preview of Cloverfield will be held in 27 cities in North America on Tuesday, January 15th.

From the site:

We have yet to get a real glimpse of the Cloverfield monster, but we all will soon enough. Paramount is holding sneak preview screenings of the film on Tuesday night, January 15th in select cities across North America. But these screenings are NOT OPEN TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. You need to have a pass to attend. How do you get a pass? Sheck your local newspapers and stores, listen to your local morning radio shows, for contests because passes will be hard to come by.

I have compiled a list of links below which includes 38 contests in 27 cities where you can enter to win a pair of tickets. Just remember, just because you enter, doesn’t mean you win. You show up without a pass, they won’t let you in. And even if you win, it doesn’t mean you’re going to see the movie. Admission is first come first serve, and people are always turned away at the door (for even the crappiest of movies) and this movie has big buzz. So, show up damn early! Good Luck!

The full list of cities with links to the various contests to get passes is here.

Cloverfield New York Party

If your planning to be in the New York City area on January 17th, you might want to "RSVP for a chance to wish our friend all the best before moving to Japan." 200 winners will be chosen to go to the party. 18 and older only. (source)

For all the details, click here.

Cloverfield Monster Attacks Chuai Station

The Cloverfield viral campaign has finally done something of interest with a fake news broadcast of an unknown thing attacking Tagruato Corp's Chuai Station. Tagruato, owner of Slusho, are websites associated with the early viral campaign for Cloverfield. Slusho is also the company that Rob Hawkins was leaving New York to go work for as seen in some of the party scenes in the trailers for the movie.

The psudo news reports are in various languages but show some pretty nice looking CGI footage as the monster makes it way to New York. Translations for the Spanish and German footage are below from Cloverfield Clues. As the above picture from Project Cloverfield shows, it seems just a smidgen of the monster makes an appearance during the destruction.

Tagruato Report in English

Tagruato Report in German

Another "News" Report in Spanish

and another in Italian

Japan News footage with Korean subtitles