Director- J.J Abrams.
During the Summer break in 1979, Six Friends are filming a zombie movie for a children's competition when they witness a train crash. Then, weird things start to happen in their quaint little town. Dogs run off, people start to disappear, household goods go missing, power is cut off and the Air force come to town. Then the friends have their film developed from the crash and see something they could never of comprehended.
J.J Abrams wrote and directed this film with Steven Spielberg producing and from watching Super 8, its easy to see that Spielberg was involved. Every ounce of the feature oozes Spielberg, with hints of Goonies, E.T and Close encounters of the third kind all fused together to make Super 8. The only thing missing is someone being eaten by a shark.
The film is glossy and has the usual Spielberg 'family' element to it, which you would expect. The typical middle-class American families with no real character's to them. The film tries to give out the feeling of broken families coming together from the events unfolding around them, but seem weak and is hardly original.
Super 8 starts OK, building a relationship with the character's, who all seem to be photocopies of the kids in Goonies, but then starts to fade around halfway through when the storyline starts to kick in. The main plot line lacks any real imagination and has been the centre of many 'monster' flicks around and even though there is a twist, its one that has been done before and is clear pretty much from the outset. The child acting is good, especially young Elle Fanning (The curious case of Benjamin Button), who plays Alice, but the adult actors lack any real characture and don't really do the film any justice.
The 'monster' doesn't so much scare, rather than make you jump and when we did see it, reminded me of the creature from Relic.
The ending to this film is my biggest concern, as it is very weak and predictable and seems to incorporate the 'Spielburg happy ending' philosophy to it, as usual, which left me disappointed, but, after all it is a 'family film'. By the way, I know I keep going on about Spielberg when it is in fact J.J.Abrams film, but once you see Super 8, you will wonder what say Abrams actually had on everything, unless of course he is just trying to be Spielberg.
Overall Super 8 is a poor film made and produced very well.
5/10
I'm in total agreement with you on this one. I had heard really good things about Super8 and was genuinely looking forward to seeing it. Unfortunately the quaint, retro wholesome American lifestyle just isn't believable. It's like Stand By Me meets Cloverfield.
ReplyDeleteMy biggest disappointment was the anti-climax. You have this long drawn out exposition but then they wrap up the movie as soon as something finally happens.
They could have taken Peter Jackson'd lead and actually made the final act of the movie as long as the previous acts combined (thinking King Kong here) and it would have made for a much more impressive climax.
I know it's intended to be a family film but I think most kids would be too bored by the beginning to bother sitting through it, and those that did would be too disappoint by the end to ever watch it again.