Having been in the Army, both active duty & reserves, I notice things like that too.
Heh… y’all don’t believe the US military has tanks, APV’s, and the like ready to take out Manhattan at a moments notice? Fools!
:adjusts tinfoil hat:
All of you! FOOLS!
This leads me to think that the US Government was so how involved with experiments and got a heads up when the creature got loose and knew it would head to NY so they started to get troops ready to deploy.
Ah, are you of the thought that the govt. created the monster? Accidentally or on purpose?
Both i suppose. I think i heard a rumor that it was supposed to be some kind of sea lab type deal but i cant think why the US would want such a creature. I also heard it might be an ET creature. But the military responded to fast, so either its part of the movie or its an overlook by the writters.
Out of curiosity, how long do you think something like that would take? I don’t know the first thing about the military.
A legitimate nit to pick, but maybe not impossible to explain away. The fact that the film is told from a worm’s-eye view means we don’t know what was going on before the “earthquake” hit that might have given the feds advance notice. Maybe satellites/planes had spotted a school of monsters swimming off the Atlantic coast. Maybe SETI detected the “Start Destroying Manhattan at 2345 hours Eastern Earth Time!” signal. Maybe seismologists detected the kind of tremors that are only caused by ancient undersea monsters waking up.
I saw the film last night and, based on some of the comments I read on this board, I was expecting despicable characters portrayed by bad actors (but I wasn’t paying for the movie, so what the heck). Instead, I thought the actors did fine jobs and the characters were believable and easy enough to empathize with. Criticisms that they were too “pretty” baffle me. If you can only enjoy movies with homely leading actors, that must really limit your viewing options. Maybe it’s more a New York/LA thing, but there are a LOT of good-looking young adults trying to be cool and acting self-centered and hedonisitc at times – like, say, at big parties where there’s music and alcohol and they’re not expecting to be attacked by a giant monster. I don’t think that makes them despicable. When it comes down to it, it’s just their way of muddling through life, hoping to make it too middle age. I did find Hud a little too stupid sometimes (“You know who Superman is!”), but for the most part the characters seemed like people I’ve actually met thrust into an impossible situation.
The shaky-cam thing was annoying during the party sequence, but could be justified by assuming that the cameraman was an idiot and had never used a video camera before. The parts that were supposed to have been shot by Rob were much smoother. Once the destruction begins, it would be hard to justify the camera NOT being shaky, given the premise.
I agree with this. The party at the beginning of the movie looked exactly like every party I’ve been to in NYC, and none of the actors in the movie would look out of place in a typical NYC bar or club (and Hud was downright unattractive).
Best guess to get some type of force in there? A day maybe? Sending in a force worth anything at all has much logistics involved. The Airborne can be anywhere in 24 hours or less. NY isnt the best place to drop but Central park should be doable as well as some other open arears around the city. Getting fighters there will only take a half hour to an hour, post 9/11. The Navy would not be to useful because of all the buildings, Norfolk is also pretty close.
I would think they could get some heavy equipment and feet on the ground pretty quickly in from Fort Dix, at least within a few hours or so post 9-11… I would think. The attack was fortunate enough to be on a weekend so there were probably some national guard units on duty anyway.
Just got back from a second viewing (with dramamine assist). Just as much fun as the first time. I went looking for details that I didn’t catch on opening night. I don’t know what happened, though, because I still missed the splash! :smack:
It seems the monster was not supposed to be a government experiment.
From http://home.windstream.net/dacevedo/cloverfield/cloverfieldproductionnotes.htm
I’m not sure how he could be “brand-new” and “in the water for thousands and thousands of years.” Maybe he existed in some sort of chrysalis stage and only emerged when conditions were suitable. Another effect of global warming?
But a press kit is not necessarily “canon.” And some people apparently saw a big splash in one of the Coney Island shots, which would imply an extraterrestrial origin. I don’t like that idea myself. That would mean the monster arrived the day Rob and Beth hooked up and destroyed New York City several weeks later on the very night they saw each other again. That seems like too much of a coincidence unless monsters REALLY hate Rob and Beth. Or maybe it was in love with Rob and it was really just trying to kill Beth. But that doesn’t seem very likely.
On another note, in the movie “Godzilla 1980,” the monster had giant lice. I don’t think the filmmakers made much use of them, but that could have been a direct inspiration for the Cloverfield parasites.
Added on preview: Apparently I’m not the only one not to see the splash!
Just remembered something. This may be a stretch* but I sensed an uncanny resemblance between the shot of Liberty’s eye and this poster from Godzilla '98.
*Stretch? what stretch? We’re talkin’ 'bout a giant monster movie here, ain’t we?
Speaking of Liberty, seems someone is a EFNY fan. 
Loved Cloverfield, tried not to think about the nitpicking too much.
It takes longer then you think to arm and fuel military tanks and aircraft. a B-2 bomber for example which you see in the end takes about 3 hours to fuel and arm IIRC.
Speaking of that poster…was the scale of the SoL’s head off in Cloverfield? It seemed a bit…small. Certainly, it was smaller than the head pictured in the EFNY poster.
Google reveals a couple of drawings that purport to be of the Cloverfield monster and some of the lice. They are shown here and here.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I would be interested to know if anyone thinks the movie monster coincides with these drawings.
No, that isn’t the monster. It was early speculation of it though, but I believe that’s actually a picture of a Final Fantasy monster/villain Sin.
They’ve had some good drawings though, haven’t seen any good photo captures yet though. Brb, someone linked a good drawing earlier but the links been disabled, lemme go hunting.
Thanks. I’m off to bed now but will check back tomorrow.
I think the scale in Cloverfield is correct, and that the marketing for Escape From New York, incredibly, got something wrong.
It occurs to me that you could tell the same story, with the POV sticking with the same small group of characters, without the home-video conceit; like the movie Miracle Mile (great movie; it followed one character and the people he encountered; you didn’t know anything they didn’t know, and it was real-time from the fateful phone call on).
I’ll probably see Cloverfield again tomorrow with my brother; this time I want to see that splash, damnit!