It is the summer of 1979—a group of friends in a small Ohio town witness a catastrophic train crash while making a super 8 movie and soon suspect that it was not an accident. Shortly after, unusual disappearances and inexplicable events begin to take place in town, and the local Deputy tries to uncover the truth- something more terrifying any of them could have imagined.
‘Super 8’ has remained a mystery to me after seeing it. For those who don’t know, JJ Abrams has been very secretive and careful in his films, and the marketing for this movie was very suspicious. I come in to this film knowing nothing, except there’s a train crash and there’s a group of young filmmakers making short movies—so there’s a borderline of excitement and also doubt going in to this.
The best way to describe this movie is its ‘E.T.’ meets ‘The Goonies’ but on a mediocre way. It’s a throwback to those Steven Spielberg flicks in the 80s (e.g. ‘The Close Encounters of the Third Kind’, etc.), and those adventure movies with kids as the heroes (well, like ‘The Goonies’.). I fairly enjoyed this movie, most of the time because of the nostalgic tone they’re intentionally setting up.
The kids in the movie are really good—I’ll give points to that. Joel Courtney leads the pack and he was okay I guess. Elle Fanning definitely got my attention throughout, she steals every moment she had. I’m guessing we’ll be seeing more of this young actress soon enough. Riley Griffiths, whom at first you’ll find annoying, was actually terrific in this movie as well. At this point, the fat kid becomes the coolest in the group. Kyle Chandler also make a brief appearance, which is nice.
The movie excels on its first two acts, where the Spielberg-ian flavor took part of the fun—with puns and references to good ol’ 80s films. But its unexpectedly going downhill on its final moments, where things got atrocious and laughable, even to the point of really serious moments got cringe-worthy. ‘Super 8’ is a not-so-good but still honorary tribute to classic sci-fi movies, but I’ll suggest you to see this than big budgeted, robots fighting robots tentpoles—it's still worth a look.
The geek rates it 7/10.
The geek rates it 7/10.
'Super 8' is now showing in cinemas and IMAX locally distributed by Solar-UIP!
