Movie Watch: Super 8 or Super Crap?

by Ada Igboanugo

If you’ve seen the trailer, the question plaguing your mind probably is ‘how can a single train cause so much damage and chaos? What is about to pop out of the remnant of the damaged train?’

Super 8 is based on a script written and directed by JJ Abrams. As to the basis of the simple and short title, the creators explain that Super 8mm film is a format of motion picture photography that was popular for home movies until the advent of video. It was both Steven Spielberg (producer) and JJ Abrams’ (director) first camera. The title of the movie stems from the fact that the main characters are working on an entry for a Super 8 film festival when the main plot of the story unfolds.

There has been some speculation and viewer conjecture that the monster, (which we assume was what was trying to come out of the train wreck) in Super 8 is related to the monster in Cloverfield (2008). While both monsters may look similar, in body and facial structure, JJ Abrams maintains that this is only because both were designed by Neville Page.

The official trailer for the movie shows a truck speeding down a dirt road and riding onto train tracks. After causing a train crash, one heavily enforced train car is shown being broken from the inside and we see the door get blown off. In the final film, these events are shown, but not from the same perspective. Instead, the same scene is seen from the limited view of the main character. Not as much of the truck is seen until it is on the tracks. Likewise, the main character only sees the backside of the train car that is smashed from inside.

The monster turns out to be an alien creature which crash landed on earth in the 1950s and was held captive by the US Air Force. It is intelligent, incredibly strong, about a storey tall and able to conceal its movements. The truck you see in the trailer is driven by Dr. Woodward (Glynn Turman), a school teacher and a disgraced former scientist for the Air Force that experimented on the alien creature.

The creature makes a psychic connection with him, and he learns that it is not evil – it only wishes to return home. When a train transporting the alien comes through his town, he uses his truck to help free the creature. This is where the action begins.

In spite of all the accolades awarded to this Steven Spielberg movie, some viewers think it is below standard, and have renamed it ‘Super Crap’.

Thankfully though, Super 8 is definitely worth a watch.

See trailer here:

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

cool good eh love2 cute confused notgood numb disgusting fail