The Cloverfield Paradox (2018)

Orbiting a planet on the brink of war, scientists test a device to solve an energy crisis, and end up face-to-face with a dark alternate reality.

Director:

Julius Onah

Writers:

Oren Uziel (screenplay by), Oren Uziel (story by)

Stars:

Gugu Mbatha-Raw, David Oyelowo, Daniel Brühl

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Gugu Mbatha-Raw	...	Hamilton
David Oyelowo	...	Kiel
Daniel Brühl	...	Schmidt
John Ortiz	...	Monk
Chris O'Dowd	...	Mundy
Aksel Hennie	...	Volkov
Ziyi Zhang	...	Tam
Elizabeth Debicki	...	Jensen
Roger Davies	...	Michael
Clover Nee	...	Molly
Jordan Rivera	...	Ayana Age 7
Michael Stokes III	...	Isaac Age 7
Celeste Clark	...	Ayana Age 4
Nathan Oliver	...	Isaac Age 4
Donal Logue	...	Mark Stambler

Storyline

In the near future, there is an energy crisis on Earth. The Cloverfield Station with a multinational crew will test the Shepard particle accelerator expecting to generate energy for all countries solving the energy problem. However, the experiment goes wrong, damages the station and opens a portal to another dimension with a parallel Earth. They also find a woman entwined with wires behind a bulkhead of the station and they learn she worked in an identical Cloverfield Station in another dimension. Now the scientists need to find a way to return to their own dimension.

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Plot Keywords:

energy crisis | particle accelerator | space station | alternate dimension | alternate reality | 

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Taglines:

The future unleashed every thing.

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Horror | Sci-Fi | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for sci-fi action, violence, disturbing images and brief strong language

Did You Know?

Trivia

A small figurine with the word Slusho can be seen in the first half of the movie. Slusho is a brand subtly featured in both of the earlier Cloverfield movies, as well as J.J. Abrams' earlier TV series Alias (2001). The viral online campaign for Cloverfield (2008) indicated that Slusho is a subsidiary of Tagruato Inc., the company behind the deep ocean drilling (and potential explosion) that woke up the monster in that movie.

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Goofs

Characters regularly refer to an urgent power crisis on Earth. For example, Hamilton talks about how she installed an illegal power cell so that her children would have lights at night. Yet everyone on Earth is shown to be using energy at current day levels: they drive cars, have cellphones, watch broadcast television and use the internet.

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Quotes

Jensen: [to Acosta] You got it working, didn't you? You got it working. Something went wrong. Shepard smashes a Higgs boson, overloaded. Somehow you ended up here. Your dimension crashed into mine. Crew must be working on power, trying to fire the Shepard again, to get you back home. Could you do me a favor? Would you mind mentioning to you crew that escaping your escaping my dimension will trap me in yours.

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Alternate Versions

When the movie premiered on Netflix, the Netflix logo appeared before the Bad Robot logo at the start of the film. When the movie was released on DVD and Blu-Ray by Paramount Pictures, the Netflix logo was replaced by the Paramount logo which still runs before the Bad Robot logo.

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Connections

Referenced in Midnight Screenings: Compliance (2018)

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Soundtracks

Tied Up
Written by Tom Stubbs (as Wolfgang Black)
Courtesy of Extreme Music

User Reviews

Cloverfield in Space

It's no mistake now that the team behind the Cloverfield series is simply purchasing films that are already shot or written and re-working them to fit within their "world". This entry into the series is no different, but at least we have a direct connection and explanation for things, which make this film the main one that will connect every single 'Cloverfield' entry from here on out.

In an attempt to produce endless energy, a group of people board a space shuttle known as The Shepard. Over 600 days in space with failure after failure, they finally manage to create something. But that something is not what they expected and now they have to fight to survive and deal with the horrors they've unleashed.

There is a moment in the film that is pure exposition, delivered by Donal Logue that really felt forced in there to be an explanation for the monster in the original film. It was such an awkward jumble of words that it stands out like a sore thumb. I felt like they could have delivered this information a bit differently, by someone on the ship maybe. There are other moments of missed opportunities as well, specifically when you are dealing with time paradoxes and alternate realties.

The film tries to deliver a sense of dread, but it doesn't really get there. There are moments where the weirdness explodes and we are dealing with severed limbs still working or body horror involving eyes and skin. I get the sense that they wanted these weird occurrences to really amp of the mystery. Sometimes it works, other times it does not. As a whole though, the film does deliver an edge of your seat sic/fi space survival flick.

Paramount clearly thought they had a stinker on their hands, which is why they dumped the film to Netflix. Saying this film sucks is a disservice to the material. It's ambitious enough to try and create a connecting tissue to the other films and anything else that Bad Robot wants to come up with. I applaud that, as well as their explanation for why things happened, to me is good enough. This film will be the most divisive one yet, that is clear.

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English Mandarin German

Release Date:

4 February 2018 (USA)

Also Known As:

God Particle

Filming Locations:

Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$45,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Bad Robot, Paramount Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

102 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.39 : 1