Cloverfield 2?????

A sequel to the recently successful Cloverfield is still being discussed between producer JJ Abrams, writer Drew Godard and director Matt Reeves. Reeves in past interviews broached the idea of a sequel that occurs on the same night as the first film, only from another camera’s perspective, as in Cloverfield there was a moment when two such perspectives intersected for a moment in the bridge scene. Firstly though, for those of you who have been living under a rock, which is actually more comforting than it sounds, Cloverfield is the biggest grandiose monster movie to hit the screens since Gojira (if you do decide to see only one incarnation then check out the pioneering, authentic 1954 film rather than its Hollywood descendant; not that the latter is bad or anything) or King Kong. It goes down like this; a man named Rob is having a farewell party as he is set to leave for Japan. His best friend is recording the party, going around interviewing people about how they will feel about him leaving. All of a sudden an earthquake of sorts occurs and leaves the guests in a frenzy. The rest is pretty much well constructed mayhem; all in all being a very gripping and entertaining film.

Although Reeves has stated that he is toying around with the idea of shooting the film in a similar style to the first only from another person’s perspective, Abrams says that he has noticed that many films seem to be using the hand held, “blogging” style of filmmaking (most notably George Romero’s Diary of the Dead) and so he is a little concerned about using that approach again, as once an idea has been recycled to many times it will lose it’s impact. However, surely if a style of filmmaking works because of its own aesthetic innovations, it should be embraced rather than disregarded just because it is becoming too popular. However, it is also a director’s mission to try to explore new places, to seek out new actors and landscapes, to boldly go where no man has gone before….hmmmm….wait a second. Ah, yes and then there’s Abrams latest endeavour, the Star Trek film which is sure to lure out all the “Trekies” from their “Learn Klingon in 2 Weeks” CDs just as I’m sure Star Con 2008 will. Though having only seen one of the films in the series and a handful of Star Trek episodes myself, I will be interested to see how a creation such as this explodes on the big screen.

In any case Abrams has mentioned that he has a new idea in which he would still like to work with Godard and Reeves only on a new project, so even if Cloverfield 2 remains to be only a Chinese Whisper it seems we should still be expecting something more from these guys.

Nathan

www.filmbanana.com

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