Cloverfield DVD Review

Get ready to be well and truly knocked off your feet with the dazzling, heart pumpingly good Cloverfield, released on DVD on 22 May. Produced by Lost supremo J.J. Abrams and directed by Matt Reeves Cloverfield is a monster movie with a brilliant twist, told from the viewpoint of a group of friends filming events with their video camera.

In the heart of Manhattan, New York the friends of Rob Hawkins are throwing a party for him as he prepares to move to Japan, making a video diary of the event to take with him, following a loud explosion and a brief power out everyone rushes out into the street to see what is going on only, in a real shock of a moment, to have the head of the statue of liberty come smashing down almost into them. Told only from the point of view of the camera this is the start of a headlong rush for survival as the group, which is soon down to four, realise that a rampaging monster is destroying the city.

Superbly intense and with some brilliantly scary, jump out of your seat moments, Cloverfield is a take on the old Godzilla, King Kong flicks but one that taps brilliantly into our common fears of the moment, the troubled times in which we live makes this whole experience only too real, substitute the monster for an Earthquake or a terrorist attack and you have something people live with on a daily basis.

Extras on the single disc edition include an audio commentary from director Reeves, some supplemental production info that is availble to view whilst watching the movie and some easter eggs (that we didn’t find), there is also a very limited edition two disc set that also included lots of deleted and extended scenes, two alternate endings, a feature on the making of the movie, a look at the visual effects and all the things also on the one disc edition.

Paramount Home Entertainment / Region 4 / 81 minutes / Rated m15+

Featuring Michael Stahl-David, T.J. Miller, Jessica Lucas, Odette Yustman, Lizzy Caplan, Mike Vogel