by Mary Anne

Created on: April 24, 2008

My expectations for this movie were pretty low. I didn't really think I would like it, but I couldn't WAIT to see it. I was very surprised when I loved it.

In many ways, this movie reminds me of M. Night Shyamalan's Signs. Let's review...

1.) Both movies leave quite a bit of the monster/alien to the imagination of the viewer until well into the movie.
2.) Both movies focus on the micro rather than the macro. By which I mean that they focus on how a disastrous event effects a small few rather than the usual how a disastrous event effects the many.

3.) Both movies scared the bejesus out of me, while probably not as scary to the general population.

The casting of young actors without "huge" names helped to make it more difficult to predict what would happen to certain characters. Often in this kind of movie, you know that the minor character is more likely to die a grizzly death than the Blockbuster Actor/Actress. This movie didn't have any blockbuster names, so everyone had just as much likelihood of dying a grizzly death.

I expected a "Godzilla" movie, and was pleased that the "monster" looked nothing like Godzilla, nor did he look anything like what I expected. I was also surprised that there were no scenes of him coming out of the ocean or anything like that. It was implied, but never shown. I think that is what I really enjoyed about this movie, the lack of the obvious scenes, instead opting for more personal scenes about the characters while this creature is waging war in the background.

I enjoyed (while being somewhat irritated) by the movie's ability to ignore what was going on in the background while focusing on the characters and their stories. I can't say how many times I silently pleaded with Hud to just move the camera a little so I could see what the military was doing to destroy the monster!

One minor thing I did not enjoy was the party at the beginning. Way too long, and not very vital to the storyline. I watched the special features, and they showed several deleted scenes that were cut because they needed to get to the creature and spend less time on the party. I think it would have been much better had more of the party scenes wound up on the cutting room floor.

Very enjoyable. I look forward to adding it to my collection.

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