1-18-08 Project Cloverfield - Warning! Spoilers

Double Negative's main task was to wreak destructive havoc upon New York City. Complex digital environments were built and then attacked with a variety of in-house CG tools. Key scenes involved creating well-known areas such as Park Avenue and high angle views across the city. A detailed digital model of the Brooklyn Bridge was built and then torn apart as refugees from the disaster attempt to flee the rampaging monster and, in the signature shot for the movie, the head of the Stature of Liberty was sent tumbling through the streets of Manhattan. (watch videos)

"Production charts have made it known that Drew Goddard will write CloverField 2. Cant really complain since the first movie was fantastic. IS it just me though or is JJ Abrams getting all the credit? Matt Reeves the directors name is hardly mentioned, nor is the writer. Anyrate I am sure you are all stoked for a sequel since so many of you loved the movie.

Paramount has to complete discussions with Reeves, Producer JJ Abrams and scribe Drew Goddard. Then of course they will have to spin together another tale for Cloverfield. Once that is complete what storyline can they go with? Another story out of the first break out? Or perhaps follow up on the ending of the first?" (source)

CS: What were the specific visual inspirations for YOUR monster?

Reeves: We hired this guy Neville Page to design the monster, and he is a genius. We would go into his office and he would have what I affectionately referred to as his "Wall of Terror". On the wall were all sorts of bits of color, and as you got closer suddenly your interest turned to revulsion because those pictures were like pictures of intestines and eyeballs and pieces of animals. What he was doing was having a biological, evolutionary basis for every aspect of the creature. That was really cool because there are parts of the monster that can do things that we actually didn't have a place for in the movie, that's how thoroughly designed he was.

The key to it is that the monster was a baby. The monster was suffering from separation anxiety and was absolutely disoriented and pissed, "where's mommy?", and terrified. That was the most important aspect of the creature. Not only was he furious and in a rage but he was scared, because to me there's nothing scarier than something huge that's spooked. If you're at the circus and the elephants are going nuts you don't want to be near them. We talked with Neville about the idea of how when a horse gets spooked you see the whites under the bottom of its eye. He fleshed out those sort of details. We talked about wanting the monster to be different in that it was white. All these different aspects which were important to us. It developed in many different ways and it came down to what Neville was doing which was amazing.

CS: Any possibilities for a "Cloverfield" sequel?

Reeves: This was so fun 'cause we'd never done anything like it, and I think we'd want to find a similar challenge, to find a way to have its roots in this but be fresh and new, otherwise you're just repeating yourself. There's a moment on the Brooklyn Bridge, and there was a guy filming something on the side of the bridge, and Hud sees him filming and he turns over and he sees the ship that's been capsized and sees the headless Statue of Liberty, and then he turns back and this guy's briefly filming him. In my mind that was two movies intersecting for a brief moment, and I thought there was something interesting in the idea that this incident happened and there are so many different points of view, and there are several different movies at least happening that evening and we just saw one piece of another. That idea sort of tickled me. We'll have to see if anyone would want a sequel. If the movie does well and we find a compelling reason to do so then it would be fun to do a sequel.

Did you see the thing in the last shot? In the final shot there's a little something, and I don't wanna say what it is. The final shot before the titles. The stuff at Coney Island, there's a little something there and I don't want to give it away 'cause the fun is sort of to find it, but I will say this: there's a funny thing, you look at the shot and until you see it you don't see it and you really don't see it and obviously you don't 'cause none of you have seen it, but once you see it you'll never stop seeing it.

CS: It's the thing dropping in the water, right?

Reeves: Ahh, you saw it.

• Reeves Runs Merrily Through >

"At the end of Cloverfield you can see something. Many believe that the origin of the Cloverfield monster is from space, and that might be true considering at the end of the movie something falls from the sky.

I still believe that the Targruto company was responsible b/c of their deep sea drilling, but maybe we'll find that out in the next movie.....i hope. The video isn't all that good and you might have to watch it in full screen, but i've seen the movie 3 times already and something does fall from the sky into the water....it happens on the horizon kinda near the boat."

"The creature-feature "Cloverfield" became the first monster hit released in 2008, debuting with $41 million, a record opening for January, according to studio estimates Sunday.

Paramount's tale of a giant reptile causing chaos in New York City surpassed the $35.9 million premiere weekend of the "Star Wars" special edition in 1997, the previous best for January. " (source)