Review of The Cloverfield Paradox (2018) by Travis H — 05 Feb 2018

The films with the smallest amount of details on the surface can be the most fun to speculate, which is exactly why I fell in fascination with the 2008 film Cloverfield. It's unconventional approach to a monster movie told from the average persons point of view, and even inspired one of my own films that same year. The franchise has always maintained a great level of marketing and The Cloverfield Paradox maintains by surprise announcing the release hours before its release.

The film takes place in a space station as scientists try to harvest a powerful amount of energy due to Earth's diminishings resources. While succeeding after months of failed tests, they tore open a paradox that effects those on the station and even more that I refuse to spoil.

As a fan of the franchise, I've always liked the idea the films never really feel similar to one another and show many different perspectives on the same series of events. The film maintains a strong sense of unpredictability as when the paradox kicks in, there's no real sense of where it will take you. Sometimes that paradox aspect works and other times it doesn't as I found myself confused on the rules of how characters are affected. This view nonetheless doesn't make the Cloverfield connection as jammed in like 10 Cloverfield Lane, however, it could have benefited from stronger characters.

The film mostly focuses on Hamilton (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), as she plays a young wife far away from her husband on the mission. While she is given a bit to work with in the first and third acts, the other characters feel slightly flat and lacking emotion for a crew that's around each other for a very long time. Chris O'Dowd is subjected to be a comic relief and not always doesn't his jokes land either.

While The Cloverfield Paradox answers some questions, it makes you ask a crap ton more. It's fascinating, yet strangely too overwhelming and derivative at the same time. I can understand this film feeling a bit harder to market than the last couple movies, but I think it does what Cloverfield is best known for, making you speculate every single thing on screen.