When Cloverfield started its marketing campaign years ago with a mysterious trailer before Michael Bay’s Transformers we had no idea what the film was about, but the teasers had us on the edge of our seats. It kept up its secrecy for many more months until the film hit theaters and we were treated to one of the best found-footage movies released thus far. J.J. Abrams is pretty good at keeping secrets (ignoring the whole Khan/Not Khan thing) and has built a career on this ability to keep audiences in the dark. Well, he’s doing it again.
Today saw the release of the first teaser for the Abrams produced 10 Cloverfield Lane (previously known as The Cellar and Valencia) which appears before Bay’s 13 Hours, and after watching it I still have no clue what it is about but damn am I intrigued. The fact that it features John Goodman is one of the many reasons. I will watch him in anything, and it looks like they are focusing on his darker side which is always amazing, though rare.
The trailer itself is interesting. It begins with three people playing board games, putting a puzzle together, and eating; fairly normal activities for sure. Then there’s a rumbling and the subtle unease bubbles to the surface as we see they are in an underground shelter for some reason. The scene becomes very dark, and it appears not everyone is in the shelter by choice. Through tense struggling and outright violence we see that there’s a monster in this shelter, but there’s something worse outside.
10 Cloverfield Lane is directed by Dan Trachtenberg from a screenplay by Josh Campell & Matt Stuecken and Damien Chazelle, and stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead, John Goodman, and John Gallagher, Jr..
The plot according to Wikipedia: After a car accident, a young woman comes to in an underground cellar, where most of the action takes place. She fears she has been abducted by a survivalist, who tells her he saved her life and that a chemical attack has left the outside world uninhabitable. Uncertain what to believe, she decides she must escape, whatever dangers she may face outside.
Could this be the long-rumored sequel to Cloverfield? It’s possible. According to that film’s director Matt Reeves, “While we were on set making the film we talked about the possibilities and directions of how a sequel can go. The fun of this movie was that it might not have been the only movie being made that night, there might be another movie! In today’s day and age of people filming their lives on their camera phones and Handycams, uploading it toYouTube… That was kind of exciting thinking about that.”
Abrams has denied a sequel was in the works for many years, but told Collider “The idea came up a long time ago during production. We wanted to make it a blood relative of Cloverfield. The idea was developed over time. We wanted to hold back the title for as long as possible.” I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what the film will be, but until then here’s the trailer.
10 Cloverfield Lane hits theaters on March 11th.
