Cinema Verdict Review: Super 8

Super 8

OPENING: 06/10/2011

STUDIO: Paramount Pictures

RUN TIME: 112 min

ACCOMPLICES:
Trailer, Official Site

The Charge
From J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg.

Opening Statement
After adding a solid installment to the popular Mission: Impossible franchise and successfully re-booting the Star Trek franchise, writer/director/producer/generally beloved media figure J.J. Abrams finally gets to tackle an original story with Super 8. Steven Spielberg is the film’s executive producer, and it quickly becomes clear that Super 8 is a love letter to the kind of films Spielberg was producing and directing during the early 1980s (E.T. and The Goonies immediately come to mind, though there are a host of other influences). While Abrams doesn’t quite match the best of the films it imitates, it nonetheless proves an engaging, touching cinematic homage.

Facts of the Case
The year is 1979, and the place is a small town in Ohio. Our central figure is Joe Lamb (Joel Courtney), a small-town middle school student whose mother passed away just a few months ago. Joe’s father Jackson (Kyle Chandler, Friday Night Lights) has become emotionally distant and buried himself in work since the accident, so Joe spends most of his time hanging out with his best friend Charles (Riley Griffiths). Charles is working on creating a low-budget zombie movie for a short film festival, and Joe is in charge of the make-up and special effects. The cast and crew is almost entirely comprised of boys, though Charles somehow talked the popular Alice Dainard (Elle Fanning, Somewhere) into playing the film’s love interest.

On one night of filming, two important things happen. The first is that Joe begins to make a connection with Alice and starts to develop feelings for her. The second is that a massive train wreck occurs nearby during the middle of filming. It quickly becomes apparent that this was no ordinary accident; the military swoops into town and refuses to give anyone even the most basic bits of information. Unusual things start happening: power outages occur all over town, dogs disappear and then people start to go missing. Joe, Charles, Alice and the gang are understandably eager to figure out what’s going on. What they don’t realize that they already have a remarkable piece of evidenced captured on film.

The Evidence
I think that’s enough information on the film’s plot. Many reviews have revealed even more than that, but the true nature of the train wreck is best left a surprise, I think. What makes Super 8 an unexpected pleasure is not the sci-fi wildness Abrams has up his sleeve, but the simple fact that this is the rare summer blockbuster which actually emphasizes character and story over action set pieces and special effects. While it doesn’t offer the same sort of gleeful adrenaline rush Abrams’ Star Trek offered, it does muster up some of that distinctly Spielbergian warmth and emotional intensity which doesn’t appear frequently enough these days.

The film’s best scenes are those which simply allow the young protagonists to interact with each other, as there’s a wonderful sense of group chemistry that’s far more thrilling than any special effect the film has to offer. Seeing this tale unfold through the eyes of these kids brings refreshing perspective to a plot that sometimes seems like an ungainly patchwork quilt of other sci-fi films. When Abrams checks in on the adults (not too frequently, I’m glad to report), we suddenly realize what a dull movie this could have been if it had been centered on a grim, no-nonsense local hero like the character Kyle Chandler plays. An adult looks at the train wreck and thinks, “This is a horrible tragedy.” The kids look at the train wreck and think the same thing, but the next day they conclude that the wrecked train would make a spectacular background for that zombie movie they’re working on. You get the idea.

There are moments between Joe and Alice which approach greatness, as Abrams offers an achingly tender portrait of adolescent longing. Consider the scene in which Joe sees Alice in zombie make-up, and Alice playfully shuffles towards him in a zombie-like fashion. Sure, she’s pretending she wants to eat him, but Joe is simply thrilled by the notion that Alice is offering such a blatant display of interest in him. Some of the young cast members have no significant previous experience, but there’s never an inauthentic moment or forced line reading during the scenes with the youngsters (most of them run circles around grown-up pros like Chandler and Noah Emmerich, but that’s partially because Abrams puts so much work into the characterization of the kids and so little into the adults).

The film starts to disappoint in its second half, as Abrams’ story starts to slip into more conventional territory (it’s handled well enough and is still engaging, but the sense of freshness that dominates the first half starts to fade considerably). It would be a solid slam-bang second half to many films, but it disappoints in this case due to the remarkable nature of the film’s first half. There are plenty of splendid moments throughout the entire film, but less of them once the characters really start running, jumping, chasing and shooting. At least things end on a strong note, as Abrams builds to a finale that ranks as his most explicit homage to Mr. Spielberg (interestingly enough, another film released earlier this year paid homage to Spielberg in a very similar but vastly less effective manner). The genius of Abrams’ conclusion is that it takes familiar imagery and turns it upside down; this has happened before but the context has changed dramatically. It’s also during these closing moments that Abrams indulges in his riskiest moments of emotional manipulation. Fortunately, they pay off due to the work Abrams has put into the build-up to them.

Closing Statement
While Super 8 isn’t quite the masterpiece it flirts with being on occasion, it’s an exceptional film which proves far more emotionally involving than the usual popcorn movie fare. Don’t miss it.

The Verdict
8/10