Now Playing: Monster Movies

In the last two days, I watched two monster movies: Cloverfield and I Am Legend. Not only is this a serious detour from normal movie-going behaviour (I tend to save scary movies for Halloween marathons) but to watch TWO in as many days. Well. It does lead to inevitable comparisons, so why even try to avoid it? Here's what I had to say about the movies on Flixter:

Cloverfield:
okay acting (Hud was hilarious) and nice special effects (when you can actually focus on it, which isn't often) but overall too short and a little too reminiscent of Blair Witch. Still: fun :) 2.5 stars out of 5.

I Am Legend:
Who knew? I had originally passed on this movie because I didn't want to watch another "zombie" movie. I was wrong. First of all, Will Smith is a phenom in it: it's basically just him and his dog for most of the movie (flashbacks and CGI zombies can't really count) and he did so well. The directing was tight: I haven't watched a movie that both scared the holy hell out of me AND moved me to tears. Fabulous - you gotta check it out. 4 stars out of 5.

...in direct comparison, though, I Am Legend makes Cloverfield look bad. Yeah, Cloverfield was fun and stuff, but for pure suspense and emotional investment, Legend is untouchable. Both Nish and I were dropped down as far as we could go in our IMAX seats, cursing each other for agreeing to see this movie and whimpering along with Sam. It was stellar. Cloverfield would have been a perfect marathon movie (short, shallow and easily dismissed); Legend would have killed a party mood totally. Where Legend leaves lots to talk about when it ends (the Fred incident is a good example), Cloverfield goes for a cheap end-of-credits trick. If you have a craving for a scary movie: check out I Am Legend and leave Cloverfield for another time.