Cloverfield Cellphotos the Destruction of NYC

What are we to make of this film, Cloverfield, which opens January 18, 2008? What is the monster? Is it the monster of the id or a cryptid? Is this MySpace horror or YouTube cryptofiction run amok? Certainly people have had fun for a few months trying to figure it out (see sample video solutions below).

What is this movie really all about? A cellphone camera version of “Blair Witch Horror” meets “Godzilla,” with a bit of “Planet of the Apes” thrown in, regarding the Statue of Liberty. And how about, jeez, those trailers? Some people love them, some people don’t.

You may have missed the earliest trailers, but the first one I saw was overusing the name of the main character, “Robert Hawkins.” But soon, there was a big problem with that.

As it turns out, the same week the trailers began screening at theaters was the same week that a real Robert Hawkins was in the news. Robert Hawkins is the name of the 19-year-old shooter who killed 8, then himself, at the mall in Omaha, on December 5, 2007. Ooops. (And some people think I make this “name game” stuff up.)

I’ve seen the Cloverfield trailers since then, and the “Robert Hawkins” references have been dropped. Sure “Rob” is still in ’em, but no more “Robert Hawkins.” I wonder if they changed the name of the character in their post-production edits too?

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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