As Lost fans know, J.J. Abrams’ production house Bad Robot creates mysterious, pseudo-viral marketing campaigns that are nearly as entertaining as the actual products they sell. So it is with Abrams’ hush-hush new movie project, the trailer for which you probably saw before your screening of Transformers last week. The clip (pictured), which showed Blair Witch-style camcorder footage of an apparent monster or alien attack on New York City, ended with a release date (Jan. 18, 2008) but no film title. Now, however, details about the mysterious movie are starting to emerge — along with some possible false leads.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, the film is called Cloverfield, though that could be just a working title or a red herring (um, it takes place in Manhattan, yes? Where’s the clover? Where’s the field?). Paramount apparently greenlit the modestly-budgeted ($30 million) film back in February when it handed Abrams the keys to the Star Trek franchise. Project was so secret that the actors signed on without being shown the script (written by Lost and Alias scribe Drew Goddard). Helping keep the budget down: they’re all virtual unknowns; biggest name in the cast is probably Lizzy Caplan, late of CBS’ short-lived 2006-07 sitcom The Class. Filming began last month on location, with Matt Reeves (who co-created Felicity with Abrams) directing.
Here’s where the possible disinformation comes in. The trailer began popping up on the Web last week, but Paramount issued cease-and-desist orders to several sites, including ethanhaaswaswrong.com and ethanhaaswasright.com. Now, Abrams, talking to Ain’t It Cool News, says those two sites have nothing to do with the film, but take a look at them; they seem awfully suspicious. (Ethan Haas, by the way, was the character played by Caplan’s co-star Jason Ritter on The Class.) Abrams says there are other secret websites, but he claims no one’s found any of them yet, except for this obvious placeholder.
At any rate, Paramount has put the trailer back online, this time in a high-def version, at Apple. Watch it, tell us what you think (for the record, PopWatch thinks it looks pretty awesome), and let the conspiracy theories begin!
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Oh, this is easy. Clearly, the ball of fire is a Rimbaldi device, detonated by the Hanso Foundation, due to grief over Felicity’s haircut.
Done and done.
…which is separated by only six degrees to Erika Christensen.
Ryan – hilarious! and obviously correct. I’m still mad about that big stupid red Rambaldi ball …GRRRR!
Hmm…speaking of Lost…any chance we’ll see a Doc Jenson article in the near future? I check every day just hoping…
I think the marketing is genius, but the downside will be that they are creating an enormous amount of hype that will be hard to live up to (i.e. Snakes on a Plane). If the movie doesn’t deliver, it’s going to crash and burn faster than that fireball in Manhattan.
While I agree the big ball is the final RAMBALDI DEVICE, i belive it is a containment unit for the Smoke Monster, which Sydney Bristow was bringing back to SD6 from a secret Hanso laboratory, when she got all curious and pressed it’s buttons, releasing said smoky in the big apple, and now she’s fighting hard to contain it with the help of ex-addict photographer Steven Caseman, who seems to be the only one to be able to get smoky’s good side on camera.
Obviously the code name “Cloverfield” is funny in itself. Like a big FU to the audience or a “Good Luck finding more info!”
But anyhow, I have been reading more about this online and am intrigued. I found out on another site that if you google the word “Bloop” you can find more information on what this film could be about.
And don’t get me started on the Rambaldi Device. For me the real Alias ended with the season 2 finale. Season 3 I didn’t fully watch, and while I watched season 4, the best part of the whole season was the “My name isn’t Michael Vaughn” cliffhanger. What a shame that such a great show turned out so bad. Damn you JJ.
Can’t anyone just make a movie, release a trailer and show it in theaters… I don’t have time in my life to sort through all this nonsense (and not get paid for it)… If the movie’s good, then people will see it regardless of all this trickery…
I think it is another Hatch blowing up…either that or Walt gone crazy!
This is the latest in marketing in a multi-viral webcast world! Get used to it kiddies! Though the idea seems great & the trailer does look uber-fierce, I have to kinda agree that with all the now-building hype, they might NOT be able to deliver a great movie as the others have mentioned. I mean, yes, I’m NOT a LOST or ALIAS fan, but I did enjoy MI:III (please shower me with love, not stones!) but there are two OTHER reasons why this film could tank tremendously AFTER a very ingenius marketing plan! 1st off is, the film is opening in January which is usually a dumping ground for post Holiday flicks while all the Oscar contenders are still finding audiences! Could either work in their favor, or horribly against them. 2nd is that well lets really take into account the last time this “new marketing, multiple hidden web-sites, and secrecy technique” was literally introduced this year: Trent Reznor’s new NIN album. Sure the hype up to the album was near deafening, but where is that cd now??
The explosion at the end of the trailer is cool but gimmicks are for suckers and JJ Abrams is overrated. A Star Trek movie? Really? We can put that right between the Alvin and the Chipmunks and Thundercats on the shelf of stupid movie ideas of 2007.
Typical Lost producer, hahaha. I love it. Can’t wait to see it.
Very cool.
Let’s go with the obvious. It’s the BAD ROBOT! : )
I’m really enjoying this lead-up to the film. I do hope they can sustain the interest and mystery (January’s quite a way away). The thing about this viral campaign is that you can get into it if you prefer, or just wait until the movie previews and information come out like normal and enjoy it the old-fashioned way.
I cannot wait to see this film. I’ll go see anything Abrams releases, really.
This whole movie is just LOST season 1 all over again. Except it’s on Manhattan and not a mysterious island. WAIT, Manhattan is a mysterious island. UGH.
WHAT IS THE MONSTER??? I don’t know, fork over your $10 and find out.
This is way cool, because we’ll get to see how people would react to a big monster in New York that has a cool growl and like to behead national monuments. And really I think that’s something that we can all appreciate.
This is way cool, because we’ll get to see how people would react to a big monster in New York that has a cool growl and like to behead national monuments. And really I think that’s something that we can all appreciate.
To Phil:
I agree with what you’re saying, but go easy on Reznor. It’s not his fault the music industry is in hard times right now (in fact, the music industry shifted tremendously between NIN’s The Downward Spiral and The Fragile, let alone the P2P programs most people use today). The last time there’s been a million seller the first week of release was 50 Cent’s The Massacre in 2005. All those hyped up fans who wanted Reznor’s CD probably downloaded all the tracks instead. I’m still enjoying Year Zero to this day, but new music turns to yesterday’s news very fast in 2007.
go to slusho.jp
the imdb.com boards said it is related, i guess that is the name of a drink on alias…
“let the conspiracy theories begin”! WELL SAID!
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Drew Goddard was one of the best writers on “Angel” and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” as well. This could be very very cooool.
its a big lion, u can hear a guy say that at the end of the preview “i saw it its a huge lion!” listen listen people!
check out the Point Break 2 trailer!
http://youtube.com/watch?v=1c1M3BMfjpo
JJ got me and all I can say after finishing those games was. the last two drove me nuts… but ETHAN WAS RIGHT!
That trailer was the easily the high point of my Transformers viewing experience, it all went downhill from there.
Say what you will, I’m a sucker for this kind of gimmickry.
I wonder whether we’ll find out what is causing all the havoc before the movie opens. My guess is yes, because if that’s all this movie is riding on, then ONE spoiler could tank this entire production.
That said, I like the handicam/small-scale feel of it. That’s pretty much unheard of in this genre, so on that alone, I’d go see this movie. On 1-18-08. (Not forgetting that title!)