Reviews

Remember when Alien was about…the alien? Hey! Here's an idea; we know what scares people. Throw that out the window and let's just take sniveling, weak characters and some CGI and try to loosely tie together 2 other movies with a weak plot. Yeah. Great idea, Sir Ridley.

I am catching the next shuttle to Mars and making an appointment with Rekall, Inc., to have any memory of this movie forever erased from my head. There are several major issues with this film:

-There is no strong protagonist. After the bumbling captain (Billy Crudup) is killed off, the teary- eyed, whiny and weak Daniels takes over (if you call it that). All of the human characters are weak, stupid, insubordinate, or a mix of all 4 and are constantly crying. You will never like any of these people.

-A weak story and plot. Wrong planet, wrong premise, and incorrect segue into what will be the original Alien movie. No explanation needed.

-Don't morph the alien. We don't breathe in the alien from spores. There are not 50 different variations of this alien. We are too confused and dumbfounded by this plot to fake interest in new and unexciting variations of the alien.

This whole movie is a mess from beginning to end. Why in the world would Scott wreck such a beautiful concept? True horror is simple, unseen, and magnificent. It is clear that Ridley has sold out to the big studios and has been forced to pollute this franchise with Avenger-esque flash and fury because we are not allowed to think and imagine anymore. We can only sit while the whims of the studios are rammed down our plugged-in throats for two hours.

This is a well-done documentary on both the Mexican drug cartels and our porous border to the south. The Autodefensas, led by a Clint Eastwood-esque commanding figure who is a Mexican surgeon and passionate about protecting the lives of his fellow countrymen from the savages who control Mexico's cartels, move from town to town disarming and eradicating the local drug lords who rule through intimidation, taxation, kidnapping, and murder. Although the intentions of the Autodefensas are good, they ultimately fall prey to their own peasant culture; once established in a town, the members revert to "flirting" with the local girls and start engaging in their own forms of corruption. The locals complain in open public forums that the Autodefensas are no better than the corrupt Mexican government. When Dr. Mireles, who was portrayed as a good family man early in the movie, eventually is overtaken by his newfound power and cultural machismo, it is clear that there is no guaranteed mode of rescue available to the Mexican people, at least none from within Mexico. This is the peasant culture that America is fighting to keep out, a culture that is so wildly different than ours, a culture which continually fails to embrace a state of descent, moral behavior, and erodes every aspect of their lives from within. It becomes clear, again, that an impermeable wall will stop the flow of drugs and corruption into America - if they can't sell it, the cartels will no longer exist. Kudos to the paramilitaries on the Arizona side who have dedicated their lives to protecting our border, language, and culture.

You can throw out any relation between the two movies, yes, regarding the story, but 10 Cloverfield Lane lacks the mystery, creativity, and realness of Cloverfield. After watching this movie it is clear that the producers were banking on the Cloverfield name to get some greenbacks and it worked ($40 mil gross with a $15 mil budget). The end leaves no mystery. Also, did anyone else notice all of the rip-offs from War of the Worlds and Men in Black? The farmhouse. The alien ship arm that grabs things up to the ship. The overused throw-the-device-into-the-alien-mouth-and-watch-it- blow-up trick. John Goodman is Tim Robbins in War of the Worlds. The whole film is just too cheesy and unoriginal. It did have a few moments of good direction, but not enough to save it for the "good film" category. If it had been titled "War of the Cloverfield Lane in Black" like it should have been, it would have been a bust on its own. Go see Cloverfield the original again for a really, really good film. I felt ripped off.