Olivia Hagen
Dr. Lacefield
April 28, 2018
Cloverfield by Matt Reeves
An Interpretive Essay
Cloverfield is a low-budget, big-brand film, featuring a great mix of incredibly gruesome scenes and a ginormous radioactive creature that unintentionally destroys the interwoven lives of the film’s characters, most of the time without the monster even being seen. As the trouble unfolds at a going-away party for one of the friends, the group decides to document their attempt to survive the night’s horrors via a camcorder. Cloverfield serves as an example of some topics discussed throughout the semester, such as Frued’s theory of repetition compulsion, Lacan’s theory of the Symbolic vs. the Real, and the elements of techno-horror and how it is ever-present in the film for both the viewers and characters. By utilizing these theories, director Matt Reeves and producer J.J. Abrams create an environment that reflects upon the philosophical ideas associated with human condition and human behavior, allowing viewers to be more entertained as they recognize themselves through the film’s characters and plot.
In Cloverfield, we see repetition compulsion through the cinematography of the film rather than the individual characters’ motives. The film touches on the Freudian theory of repetition compulsion, referring to the natural human behavior of going back to a bad situation in order to try to understand it better. The film is set in Manhattan, particularly in a wealthy district of the metroplex. From the beginning explosion scenes when the monster makes its grand entrance, the scenes make glaring comparisons to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It can even be seen as a sort of conspiracy theory of the event. One of the characters, Hudson Platt, early on in the film states, “I don't read the papers. Maybe our government made this thing … I mean, you know, maybe it was an accident, or maybe it was on purpose.” A random guest at the party even asks, “Think its another terrorist attack?” These quotes alone is a pointed jab at some of the complex theories as to the U.S.’s involvement in the events that unfolded on 9/11. Additionally, the scenes closely resemble the real landscape of the city during and after the destruction of the Twin Towers: including falling skyscrapers, burning buildings and billows of smoke filling the streets. The hysteria of the citizens running through the streets, away from something that they cannot even see through all the haze, is also very similar to the sense of panic running through the streets during the real event. Many films have elected to re-invent a disaster in Manhattan, which continues to resonate within viewers, yet also is highly entertaining in a sense. Additionally, the sense of finding entertainment in the explosions and hysteria that came from 9/11 is strictly taboo in American society, but adding in the monster as the source of these events makes it appropriate to find pleasure in a New York disaster with similar elements of destruction. It present us with a 9/11 caused by a radioactive monster, but with the cinematography so closely resembling the real images of New York when the Twin Towers went down. This film, I believe, was an intentional repetition of the tragic event in American history, but with the entertainment features added to make the film appropriate. Humans feel compelled to go back to these tragic events in our history, perhaps to provide a new perspective, and Cloverfield attempts to do this.
In another view, Lacan’s theory of three psychoanalytic realms — the symbolic, the imaginary, and the real — is very active in the film’s plot. Lacan discusses these three sectors as part of the human condition to categorize things consciously and subconsciously. The symbolic represents the realm that organizes and limits us to our own experiences in terms of language, words, writing, and signs. On the other hand, the Real is the part of our reality that is not easily tapped into because is it beyond logic, beyond symbolism and imagery; it is violent and traumatic and not possible for us to experience through language and words. In Cloverfield, there is a great contrast between the Symbolic and the Real. The film seems to transition from the Symbolic to the Real, and at the very end, back to the Symbolic interestingly so. As a main character, Rob Hawkins and his love interest Beth, the film opens up to the budding of a romantic relationship between the two long time friends. The morning is beautiful: sunny, happy, and full of chocolate covered strawberries. Rob tells his camcorder: “It's 6:42 AM. Beth's dad's place. He's out of town. And it's already a good day.” The day continues into night, and the viewer arrives to his going away party; he has recently accepted a VP position in a Japanese oil drilling company. In a nutshell, life for Rob and his immediate friends is orderly and predictable and balanced … until its not. The film then plunges the characters (and subsequently, the viewer) into the Real when the monster breaks into the city out of the Hudson River. The film employs characteristics of the Real via the techniques of “found footage” via a camcorder. The camcorder enhances the feeling of panic, nausea, and claustrophobia associated with the Real by using intense shaking of the camera, glitches, and the restriction of vision for the viewer. While the viewer hears screams and knows there is a monster ravaging the city, it is not until 45 minutes into the film that viewers are given their first look at the monster due to the limits of the camcorder’s frame of view. Finally, at the end of the film, we are taken back to one last scene: Rob and Beth are on top of a ferris wheel at Coney Island. The viewers are taken back to the Symbolic, and reminded of their own happy experiences associated with first dates and sunny weather. In the distance, a satellite drops from the sky, leaving the viewer restless yet left in a familiar world.
Cloverfield is an also a multi-faceted example of techno-horror, as the multiple ways technology cuts into the film makes the film much more thrilling as compared to the feelings a monster on its own could invoke. Technology is interwoven so intricately into the film that it is requires a close watch of the film to understand its impact. The five key characters in this film are young adults in Manhattan, living in high rise apartments and seem to be very well off, despite their young age. The characters’ ages and maturity levels seem to hone in on the idea that the younger generation is heavily reliant on technology to function, yet very oblivious of deeper issues in one’s life. The choice of characters illustrates the constant presence of technology in modern societies as well. This is also true for any tragic event in our society: there always seems to be documentation through videos or photos that capture the event. The film introduces all five of the main characters together when Hud carries a camcorder around at Rob’s going away party in an apartment with a skyline view. The camcorder quickly becomes the most central object in the film, rather than the radioactive monster lurking. This camcorder is mentioned on many occasions, especially referenced to the importance of documenting every single thing:
Rob says to Hud, “You still filming?”
Hud replies, “Yeah people are gonna want to know how it all went down.”
Rob says, “Well, you can just tell them how it all went down, Hud.”
Hud replies, “No, that wouldn't work. People need to see this, you know? It's
gonna be important. People are going to watch this.”
Hud and Rob continue to take turns documenting their journey through the film, until Hud is killed and Rob takes over permanently. When Hud is killed, the monster takes him head first into it’s mouth along with the camera, making the viewer even experience the feeling of his death more intensely. Without the technology present in these scenes, we would not be exposed to the same horrific feelings that the camcorder produces. Additionally, the entire group is constantly looking for more communication methods; they even rob a corner store to take Nokia cell phones with fully charged batteries. It seems as if some of their panic comes from the importance of keeping technology at their side to use when they need to solve an issue. When their phones die, they continue to use the camcorder, and the camcorder becomes the lens in which even they see some of their worst obstacles. An example of this is when the group is in a subway tunnel, and the night vision feature on the camera allows Hud to see a parasite that is preparing to attack the group and infect them with poison. The film makes sure the viewers sees the large parasite before the characters in the film even do, showing how the characters rely on technology to get them closer to getting out of the city. Technology’s presence in the film is the overarching theme that not only makes the characters’ experiences, but also the viewers’ experiences more heightened and thrilling. It has an ominous and subtle presence, but is nonetheless transformative for the film experience.
Overall, Cloverfield is chock full of scenes and quotes that fall into many of the philosophical ideas discussed in class. However, these three topics seemed to be present throughout the entire film, for both the viewer and the film’s characters’ experiences. The use of Frued’s theory of repetition compulsion brings viewers into a less controversial re-creation of 9/11 events without the guilt attached; Lacan’s theory of the Symbolic vs the Real allows both the viewer and characters to transition from the Symbolic and orderly to the Real and disorderly; the use of technology builds the characters into recognizable people in our functioning society, while also helping the viewer appreciate how technology heightens the horrific features in the film.