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Matt Reeves Comes to Cloverfield
Cloverfield opens up a whole new world for Reeves
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MM: From the beginning, you knew that the film would be shot handheld, which certainly makes the film a much more intimate experience. But considering that it’s supposed to be shot with one camera, from the perspective of one character who really knows nothing about using a video camera, it must have posed some unique challenges, not the least of which is making a professional film look “amateurish"… in a professional way! So how did you do it?
MR: We shot the movie on four different digital cameras. Two of them—the Thomson Viper and the Sony F-23—were heavy, professional ultra-high-resolution cameras which we had to use for most of our VFX shots. But the other two were actual HD handicams. I thought it was critical that as much of the movie as possible be shot on the kind of tiny, lightweight cameras that the audience watching the film might own themselves. Those light cameras have a certain look and feel that you cannot reproduce by shooting exclusively on a 50 to 60-pound camera, and I thought an audience would catch that in a second, and the illusion would be broken.
It was tremendous fun using those little handicams. I actually ended up shooting a lot of the film myself, because I am definitely not a professional camera operator, and I thought that would add to the amateur look of the film. The experience was the closest I’ve come professionally to the fun of shooting those 8mm films when I was a kid. I also wanted the actors to be able to shoot as much as possible, too. I would put the camera in their hands and stand off to the side with a little monitor and watch what they were doing, and we would try to shape the scenes of the course of anywhere from 40 to 60 takes. We did a lot of searching and improv. TJ Miller, who plays Hud, actually shot an enormous amount (especially in the party scene), because I thought it was important for the actors to have him to play off of instead of our camera operators—I thought it would add to the reality to have the camera in his hands. Then, when we finally shot on the big cameras, I had our incredibly talented professionals mimic the feel of what we’d been shooting on handicam. It was grueling because of how heavy those cameras were—there were a lot of accidents—but our operators were amazing.
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COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
- Comment by James Milford on 2/04/08 at 5:13 am
This was the worst film i’ve seen, pointless and a waste of £6.50. It gave me motion sickness and was very unrealistic!
james
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