"It kind of looks like Godzilla without fur."

That beautiful quote comes from a co-worker of mine describing the Cloverfield monster a couple of days before I got to see the movie. Having seen it now, I guess that is as apt a description as any. I remember seeing the trailer for Cloverfield during a screening of Transformers this past summer. I turned to my friend Matt and said, "That is one of the best trailers I've ever seen." It showed you just enough to make a genre-whore salivate. Flash-forward six months and I'm hearing that the movie doesn't live up to the hype. I felt a bit disappointed since very few things are capable of living up to the onerous hype these deft modern marketing campaigns generate. "Oh well," I thought, "I'll still see it anyways." Lucky for me that I did.

Cloverfield delivers the goods as advertised.

It's not Godzilla-meets-Blair Witch. First of all, Blair Witch works completely as a total mind-f@!k. Your imagination generates every scare in that picture. I still think it stands as one of the most innovative pieces of horror I've ever seen. While Cloverfield (for the most part) keeps reveal-shots fleeting, it still shows you something. Still, the film doesn't really linger on the monster for any significant amount of time until the end. The camerawork takes a minute to acclimate to, but it does manage to amp up the tension. You feel like what you're watching could actually be happening. And anyone familiar with Manhattan will love all the little touches of authenticity (it's a blast trying to figure out exactly what neighborhood the protagonists are in during any given scene). I wanted to personally congratulate the filmmakers for making the movie on a budget of only $25 million. I can't wait to check out the DVD and find out how they did it.

The film is a brisk hour and change. I couldn't complain about the length, because it told its story efficiently and I was entertained every step of the way. The characters while not memorable are certainly believable and the actors never detract from what's happening on screen. The whole production just feels well executed. Even though you only produced it, this effort almost makes up for Mission Impossible 3, Mr. Abrams. Almost.

Apparently producer J.J. Abrams (Lost and Alias) got the idea to do this movie after a trip to Japan. He wondered why we didn't have an iconic mutant monster of our own in the States (King Kong is too cute for his tastes). So he dreamt up Cloverfield. Whether or not the unnamed beast in the flick will ever attain such status will be up to audiences. Either way, the film is a welcome addition to the club.