Super Gr-8!!
“Super 8” (4 Stars out of 5)
It’s the perfect amalgam of all the best movie genres. Barrowing bits and pieces from comedy, drama, science fiction and even horror, director JJ Abrams and executive producer Stephen Spielberg have teamed up to bring the exact type of film that movie-goers have been missing in their summers for many years. Even though it dabbles in the darker side of the PG-13 and R ratings, “Super 8” should fall on collector’s shelves next to classics like “The Goonies” and “E.T.” for decades to come.
One thing about Abrams, as fans learned from his hit television show “Lost,” is that he’s very driven by the development of his characters. From the previews, you’re drawn to the mystery of what emerges from a train that’s crashed. The original trailer shows the wreckage, and at the end of the teaser, someone or something is trying to bust through that metal door of a felled train car. The finished product however, is much more than your run of the mill monster flick. The movie focuses on the story of six friends, coming together during summer vacation, amidst the tragedy of one of them losing a parent, trying to create a movie to enter into a local film contest. The kids’ film focuses on a zombie epidemic that’s sweeping a small town, all the scenes being captured on a Super 8 camera.
Abrams brings us back to the late seventies. Lillian, Ohio is the typical small town. The Sheriff’s Deputy, Jackson Lamb (Kyle Chandler, “Friday Night Lights”) has lost his wife in a recent accident at her job. Lamb is the type who’s always been more married to his job than to his wife, it will be the first time he’ll be faced with having to be a real father. His immediate answer is to ship his son Joe off to summer camp. Joe (Joel Courtney) wants to stay behind and help his friend Charles (Riley Griffiths) direct his zombie movie that he’ll enter into the local film contest. Joe and Charles have friends Cary, (Ryan Lee) Martin (Gabriel Basso) and Preston (Zach Mills) that are helping out as well. Martin is the film’s lead actor while Preston plays all the extras and Cary stands in as all of the movie’s zombie characters. Charles decides that his film would be even better with a love interest, so the boys enlist the help of Alice Dainard, (Elle Fanning) a cute young girl that Joe just so happens to have a crush on. Alice and Joe have a classic Romeo and Juliet type romance going on as Joe is the Deputy’s son and Alice’s father is town’s local roughian.
Charles brings everybody to the train station in the dead of night to film a scene that will take place between Martin and Alice, where Martin playing the detective will tell his wife that she needs to leave town. They see a train coming, and Charles scrambles his crew together to shoot the scene as the train storms through. He believes shooting with the train moving in the background will add greatly to the scene they want to shoot. As the cameras roll, Joe spots a pick-up truck on the tracks; he immediately realizes something is horribly wrong. The kids scatter as train and truck collide and explosions ensue. The crash will probably end up being one of the most action-packed sequences from any movie that will be released this year. It is a wonder when all of the kids rise from the debris, unscathed. Everything that follows thereafter should be seen in theatres, rather than read on this blog. The paragraphs that follow do not give too much away.
The United States Air Force arrives and immediately starts to clean up the crash. The people of Lillian, Ohio are left wondering what exactly happened. Suddenly, strange things start to happen in town. The power goes in and out, local car dealerships are missing key components of their vehicles and even the dogs are disappearing and turning up in other counties. Then there’s the case loads of ‘metal Rubik’s cubes’ that the Air Force is picking up and packing away. Once locals, including the Sheriff start disappearing, Deputy Lamb takes it upon himself to figure out just what the heck is going on.
“Super 8” is probably a better movie if you go into it not knowing everything, so try not to read too many reviews. It’s only major flaw may be what audience the film is trying to cater to. It is far too dark for younger kids, with scary scenes as well as profane language and drugs being used. At the same time, the main characters being too young (middle schoolers,) may polarize an older movie audience. Those that are old enough to remember “The Goonies” and “E.T.” should find solace in the nostalgia the film provides. Abrams’ resume on the silver screen includes “Mission Impossible 3” as well as the revamped “Star Trek,” and we all know what he presented fans with the TV series “Lost.” He mixes all the best aspects of his works thus far with this release and having Stephen Spielberg as a mentor, is not too shabby either. In fact, if Abrams keeps making the right moves, he just may be the next Spielberg.
Keep them coming JJ!
“Super 8” is rated PG-13: it contains violence, sequences of horror, profanity, some blood and gore as well as limited drug use.
