I am going to do this review in two parts. The main review here will be vague and reveal as little as possible, while sharing my overall feeling of the film. However, there are many things I want to talk about that would be spoilers for the film. So I will post a comment with those points. If you don't want to read spoilers, just dont read the comments.
This movie was a great, intense story that dragged you right into the plight of the main characters. It was probably one of the most realist feeling movies I have seen in a long time. Which is amazing considering the story was so fantastical.
Here is the big warning. Sit in the back. And if you get motion sickness, take your Dramamine. Or don't go. My brother-in-law had to leave the movie toward the end, and get a little fresh air.
Without revealing to much I think I can get away with saying that the entire movie is supposed to be from the visual point-of-view of the people in the story holding a camcorder, recording what is going on. However, the filming in this film was much better than Blair Witch. In fact, I thought the filming was fantastic.
The very first of the film had the video quality of camcorder, although perhaps a really nice one. I was worried because visual quality is something that can wreck a movie for me. But that first part was just to establish the framework of the film, because not a minute into the movie and we were at full qualify. What was really nifty was they sneaked the switch in so I didn't see where the switch was made, and I bet no one else in the theater even noticed.
The really masterful thing about the filming was that you never once got pulled out of the idea it was these people just holding a camcorder while experiencing the intense events. And yet, while it felt like some amateur holding the camera, you saw exactly what you needed to understand the story. It was masterful. Even that does not describe how this movie felt to me. Emotionally, it felt to me like maybe I was the one holding the camera. Maybe I was there going through this too.
I don't know how soon I can see this film again. It was very intense. And I really empathized with the people and their plight. When it was over I was exhausted. However, the ride was fantastic.
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*** WARNING *** SPOILERS ***
As this movie was progressing along, I realized it took much of the story development ideas from the classic disaster movie format. If you read my review of "Earthquake" you know how much I like that style of movie. Not very much.
On the surface, the format seems the same. Introduce all the people in a soap-opera style to make us care about them, then throw them all into a disaster and see how they do. And before the film is out, kill them all off.
So what made this film different? The big difference was none if it felt contrived. The beginning felt like you were hanging out at a fun party with real people, people you know. Once the monster stuff starts, everyone reacted in a very real way. And the camera style just added to the realism.
The second different is as each person died, the impact on the other people was felt. Some in shock, others in sorrow. And just the right amount of time was taken to make it feel real.
The last difference was the ending. Normally, in a movie like this, I just get mad that everyone died, and I can't care about them or their stupid plight. However, with the little tail they tacked on, for some reason the story didn't feel as pointless at the end. It was a bit ironic, with the line "This was a best day every", but gave us a final connection to the characters. Much more satisfying than just having the camera pull back to a view of a destroyed city.
However, one other thing that made a big difference was the fact that this movie wasn't stupid. Yah, that may have been my favorite thing about this movie.
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